The Boy of a Thousand Faces
by curly-sue-not-sue
Summary: 'It wasn't a good identity, but it was a start.' Filling in the Blackthorne Boy's past, with the second book in Zach's point of view. Spoilers for all of the books throughout!
1. Prologue--Before

**Starting over with intent to finish this. Thanks for reading!**

**Disclaimer-I own nothing**

* * *

><p>PROLOGUE<p>

BEFORE

The gun was cold in his hand, like it was made of dry ice, and everything in him screamed to drop it and _run_. Run from the gun, from the bound man kneeling in front of him, the life than had been set for him since the day he was born.

Still, Zachary Goode didn't drop it. The chilling feeling in his hand anchored him, made him feel real in his oblivion, and he held onto it with everything he had.

"Zachy, sweetie, are you strong enough for this? Or do I have to do it?"

His mother's cloyingly sweet voice made his head snap up. He didn't know what he had been staring at before—the gun? The man he was supposed to shoot, the one with a sack over his head?—but her sudden appearance in his consciousness was enough to snap him out of whatever trance his panic had trapped him in.

"No," he croaked, his throat coated in sand paper. "I'm fine."

But it was a lie. Most of the things he had ever told Catherine, his mother, had been a lie.

Every muscle in his body was cramping with tension, coiled like a spring, and Zach knew that he was bound to explode at any moment. His chest rose and fell at a rapid pace, his heart pounding at his temples, hard and fast, and Zach knew he was going to have a panic attack if he wasn't careful.

_I have to do this. I have to do this. I have to do this._

Across the room, Zach's mentor watched him. Even though Joe Solomon's face was passive as ever, Zach saw the nearly imperceptible worry in his eyes. The unspoken reminder; the silent reminder—_don't do this. There's no coming back._

"Zach," Catherine cooed again, her voice lined with a growl. It was her entire life summed up in one voice; the clear, crystalline bell, the lurking beast. "Get it done. Prove yourself."

_What does this prove?!_ Zach wanted to howl. _That I'm as much of a monster as you?_

The words never left his throat, though. He tightened his grip on the gun. It was raw with sadistic possibility—it reminded him that he existed.

He was tired of oblivion. He wanted to feel something, even if it was crippling remorse.

He wanted to know who he was, even if it was just a human with the ability to make another human stop breathing.

It wasn't a good identity, but it was a start.

And with trembling fingers, Zach pulled the trigger.


	2. Chapter One

_ONE_

He never knew his dad.

Not knowing who dominated half of his genetics was not something Zach suffered alone. Most Blackthorne boys had such dysfunctional family situations that Zach felt guilty for anything approximating a pity party.

Even in the Circle, men and women twice his age would mention their families; their fathers that were no more than hazy figures that felt like nothing more than ghosts; their danger-dominated childhoods full of blood and guns and the constant fear of falling asleep because you never knew what would wake you up if you did.

As Zach got older, the stories got more tragic. Dead families, tortured husbands and wives, children that went to their bus stop and never came home… The sadness in the people around him was infinite.

The stories always brought the black hole in Zach's life—the father—to the forefront of his mind. He didn't look much like his mother, minus similar eye color and the same smirk. He looked like someone, somewhere, who lived as a man or a legend or a body rotting in the ground.

Catherine never talked about him. Even in her weak moments—when she had a couple of glasses of her favorite bourbon and a shot or two of scotch; the times her mind went hazy with insanity, her eyes cloudy and glazed—she would never say his name.

Before Zach knew better, they would sit in the living room of Catherine's old house off the coast of New Jersey. The old one by the sea, with creaking floorboards that were loose enough for him to hide his favorite GI Joe figurines.

Usually, Catherine drank herself to sleep and ignored him or shoved him around until she got tired or bored. If he kept on, she would get truly violent, slapping him and screaming at him to never ask about _that man_ again.

_That man._

Zach knew this was the most significant information he would ever get—the forbidden question, the seething hatred in her voice- and it wasn't worth much. Catherine hated a lot of people. Did it mean that his father, the faceless mystery that haunted his entire childhood, was evil enough for his _mother_ to hate him so much?

The rational part of Zach's brain told him it was another one of her unprecedented hatreds. There had been a lot of those; people she worked for, people who worked for her, the people who gave her change at gas stations, movie stars… She was a hatred slut and not at all particular.

It was one of the many things about being Catherine Goode's son that made Zach burn with shame.

So whenever anyone asked about his family—usually unknowing civilian girls that he flirted with whenever he was bored or needed cover—he said his dad had died in a car wreck.

His mom had been too focused on her career, so Zach's uncle had raised him since he was four.

It was a good lie, mostly because it was based off of the truth.

It was an excellent lie, because it was all part of Zach's childhood dreams and the world they created.

The most important part of that world was always Joe. When he was little, Zach used to imagine that Joe Solomon really was related to him. In those days, Zach even wished Joe was his dad; it would be so much better than being the son of a ghost.

That version of the universe was one that reality only indulged for so long. Zach was six when the truth of his parentage sank in.

By the time he was learning to shoot his first gun, Zach had stopped dreaming of a different life and had prepared himself for the real one he lived in. He was a part of the Circle and, like it or not, he was going to be one of them someday.

(He thought he was ready to accept his fate. It was the smart, rational thing to do.)

Still, Zach, as much as he hated it, was Catherine Goode's son. He may have been smart, but not always rational.

So he let himself listen to other people's stories, even when he knew there was no point to carrying the burden of people who were just as broken as he was.

He let himself look up to Joe Solomon, even when he knew loving a man as a father who was bound to die any day was as stupid as it could get for any kid.

He fought against the world he had been dropped in; the future he had been told was set.

He wished for a life—for people—that he could never deserve, let alone have.

Being rational was the best way for Zach to be the opposite of his mother. Maybe it would have been the best choice, in the end.

It sure would have made his life a hell of a lot easier.

ooo

At the Blackthorne Correctional Institute for Boys, Joe Solomon was not just a badass agent; he was a god. He was what the boys wanted to be when they grew up. He was Superman and James Bond combined. He was the ruggedness of Indiana Jones and the devil-may-care attitude of Han Solo, the skill of Jason Bourne thrown in for good measure.

If they were lucky enough to live past twenty, every Blackthorne Boy wanted to be Joe Solomon when they grew up.

Still, Zach sometimes wondered how the boys would feel if they knew the real Joe. What would happen if they saw the cracks in his armor, the ghosts that trailed him wherever he went?

It was in his power to find out. Because Zach knew Joe's secrets; Zach knew everything.

(He knew Joe's fears, his secrets, his regrets and his dreams.

He knew about the family Joe wished he could belong to.

Zach knew that Joe loved Rachel Morgan more than anyone in the world.

He knew that Joe was insanely jealous of Matt for his abilities. Matt's normal childhood and loving parents; his family, his daughter.

Zach knew that Joe blamed himself for Matthew Morgan's involvement with the Circle.

Zach knew everything.)

None of this changed the fact that, like the other Blackthorne Boys around him, he, too, wanted to be Joe Solomon when he grew up.

Even with the familiarity, it was Zach's respect for Joe that made him stand at attention when Joe came to visit the school. All of the boys stood straighter—spines rigid, shoulders squared—when Joe was around.

It was the end of his first semester as a sophomore, and as Joe walked into the mess hall, Zach stared straight ahead, chin up. He didn't question why his mentor was there or why Joe's hands fidgeted as he walked to the front of the room.

It was late fall, and Joe hadn't come by for a couple of months. The rest of the boys had begun to wonder when he would return. Joe had been coming to Blackthorne for years; he did training exercises and worked out with them, then left as soon as he had come. Since Zach had been there, he had been around more frequently—whenever he could slip away from the CIA, the Circle and, more recently, Gallagher.

Even if the visits were unpredictable, there was usually a rhythm to how often Zach would wake up to Joe flicking cold water on his back, as he had done when Zach was a kid; how often he came back.

While the rest of the boys theorized, Zach kept the truth to himself; that Joe Solomon was teaching at the Gallagher Academy. He was being waited on hand and foot by ex-CIA, served fancy food while they ate cold meat and drank water; he slept in a soft bed that wasn't infested with fleas; he didn't have to wake up at five and do morning drills in the driving rain; he got to teach a bunch of teenage girls who had never gone to sleep hungry or had to kill someone just so they would learn how to sleep with the guilt.

One of these girls was Cameron Morgan, the girl that Zach felt like he already knew like the back of his hand. That he hadn't met her felt trivial.

Zach forced his mind to snap back to the present, which consisted of a clean-cut Joe who barely looked worse for the wear after his hours-long helicopter ride. His white shirt was tucked into black pants, a stark contrast to the Institute's hideous yellow jumpsuits; Zach saw that Joe's hands were restless and tapping against his leg as he gave a brief speech, his voice carrying despite the lack of a microphone.

Joe's words—addressed in his usual rough, no-nonsense voice—were short. It wasn't even an announcement, really; it was a challenge.

A semester at the Gallagher Academy.

Who was brave enough to go out into the unknown? Who had enough guts to wear a tie and blazer for an entire semester? Who wanted to act like a rich boy, like a millionaire, like everything every Blackthorne boy knew he could never be?

Zach didn't even question whether or not he was going. By the way Joe Solomon gave him a secret smile on the way out of the room, Zach knew that he had already been signed up for this mission.

Or, as Joe called it, 'adventure'.

Two weeks later, Zach was almost ready. In terms of supplies, background knowledge of the school and its students, he was fine.

But in everything else… His hands were shaking a lot and his mind was constantly going into overdrive and he hated it.

He loathed them, the nerves. The little bastards that made had made his life hell for so long.

He knew that he shouldn't be nervous. He had lived a life harder than any sixteen year old boy should ever have to endure. Technically, spending a semester at the spy-equivalent of Hogwarts wasn't supposed to make him nervous.

If anything, he should have been excited; ecstatic, even. It was a different side of life, one that Joe had tried to show him for so long, and it would be at his fingertips.

It was an unknown world, though. It was vast and filled with people who didn't trust him and looked down at him and a thousand other things to worry about.

For example, he had never had to worry about clothes before.

Of all of Zachary Goode's failings, his disinterest in what he threw on in the mornings was one of the few that he was actually proud of. But as he was packing his single allotted duffel bag, he couldn't help but wonder if that needed to change for this particular mission.

After about five minutes of debating in his head, Zach decided that his meager collection of jeans and t-shirts would be enough. And, of course, his jacket.

"Well," Joe Solomon said from the doorway of Zach's small, windowless room, "Packing early, I see?"

"Yeah," Zach admitted. He had a week before they left, but he was antsy and eager to have something to do.

"You still have that jacket, huh?" Joe walked over to the bed that Zach was using as his packing surface. Joe ran a hand over the soft, suede leather. "I remember you having it as a kid."

Zach shrugged, but didn't say anything more. The jacket was worn and faded from years of use. It used to smell like pine and men's cologne, but it smelled like Zach's soap after so many years of his wearing it.

Once upon a time, it had been big enough to cover his knees when he stood up. His big shoulders slightly strained the aged suede leather; it fit (almost) perfectly).

If it really was a jacket that used to belong to Zach's mystery of a father, as he suspected, they would have been the same everything by now; same height, size, stature...

Zach looked over to Joe, who was staring out the single grimy window in the room. The old childhood musings swept back into his mind, making him question everything Joe had ever told him about his dad. According to Joe Solomon, he had never known; no one had.

The thought quickly flitted out of Zach's mind. It wasn't realistic and it never had been because in reality, as much as he wished it to be otherwise, Zach looked nothing like Joe Solomon.

"How different is it? Gallagher." Zach asked, hoping the subject change was subtle. He watched Joe, looking for an indication that he knew how loaded the question really was, but all he saw was a disconcerting smile on the face of his mentor. The smile of someone thinking about something that made them really, really happy.

Joe sat on the bed, elbows on knees, looking off into space. "It's…" He trailed off, at a loss for words. It was a truly terrifying thing to see. "It's completely different, I'll warn you. Everything there is just so much more... Beautiful."

It was obvious that Joe was not actually talking about the school, but Zach stayed silent.

"Don't worry, Zach," Joe murmured after a pause. "You'll love it there."

Zach's real questions—why do they trust me enough to be there? Why choose me in the first place?—stayed caught in his throat, like all the words he had never said but should have.

Besides, they were questions that Joe would never answer.

There were some truths that are so bitter—so completely and utterly crushing—that even the bravest spies won't tell them.

"Don't like it too much, though, Zach," Joe said, shaking himself like a man emerging from a dream. "Getting attached to anything out there would… It would be the end of you."

Zach nodded, like he was listening so carefully. The air was heavy with things unsaid, so Zach smirked and nudged Joe, saying with a smirk, "Come on, Joe, _I_will be fine."

Joe shook his head, brushing off Zach's joking tone. "I'm serious, Zachary. You know what I'm talking about."

Zach felt his sad excuse for comic relief deflate. He turned back to his packing, avoiding Joe's eyes as he looked over his sparse belongings, double-checking that he had everything he needed but could pack a week ahead of time.

(A week. That was all he had.)

Ignoring the sudden dryness of his mouth, the vibrating of his skin, Zach muttered, "Not entirely, Joe, no," under his breath.

Joe's eye roll was so pronounced, Zach almost heard it. "I know you hacked into her file and read her report. Even though I told you years ago to let that crush go, you have also looked up every picture the database had to offer."

Zach bristled. "It's your fault for telling me about her. Since I was four."

"Yes, well," Joe cringed. "Just add that to the long list of things I have done to wrong the Morgan women. And you."

"I will," Zach replied, quick as lightning, his voice weighted down with sarcasm. "I have it under my bed somewhere, so give me a second to find it. Do you have a pen, perchance?"

Joe rose, stalking over to Zach. They were almost the same height, but Zach had never felt smaller as Joe put a strong hand on Zach's shoulder, his eyes blazing with something Zach couldn't name.

"You will meet her, yes," Joe said. He cleared his throat. "You will like her immediately. Given time, you might even fall in love with her. And don't roll your eyes and scoff because I know you, Zach, and I know how you have thought of Cammie Morgan as this sort of unattainable princess that you can charm into being just as fascinated with you as you are with her. I don't doubt you could. But I'm telling you now that you need to stay away from her. You're a good guy, Zach, but I made a promise to Matthew, a promise that I intend to keep. I need to get her as far away from anything to do with the Circle as possible, and..."

Joe's words, so forceful before, trailed off. The whole moment was unsettling, but the thing that bugged Zach the most was how ragged Joe seemed. He seemed completely shattered. Over what, Zach couldn't say, but he knew that it was huge.

Joe lifted his iron grasp of Zach's shoulder. Both of their gazes drifted to the floor, like they were both out of words and were looking to the infinite wisdom of their shoes for guidance.

"I'm sorry to be so hard on you, kid," Joe said. Zach smiled ruefully at the use of the nickname Joe hadn't used since Zach was ten. "But I need to say what I need to say before you get in too deep. It's easier this way."

Zach nodded as his stomach curled into a knot. He looked up at Joe, and the truth suddenly hit him in the face like a bulldozer; he understood the desperation of the warnings. The cracks in Joe's armor.

"How are things with Rachel, Joe?"

Joe winced, then again when he realized how much emotion that one movement conveyed. The pieces of Zach's mentor were slowly sliding back into place. It was like watching an explosion in reverse.

"She's the same as she's always been, Zach. We've both been stressing about this exchange, and I went back…"

"The Circle?" Zach guessed. "Over break?"

Joe nodded, sinking back onto the side of the bed. He put his face in his hands.

He did not need to say anything else. Zach understood.

The Blackthorne Boy—resentful of the implications of the speech; nervous about the upcoming months; as lost as ever—sat beside his mentor. He leaned his elbows on his knees and made himself nod. He made himself listen.

He made himself _be_ Joe.

"Okay, Joe," he said. "I'll do what you say."


	3. Chapter Two

_TWO_

Ever since he was four, Joe had told Zach stories of Cammie Morgan.

It wasn't like sit-down-and-listen-before-bedtime stories. They were more like I'll-tell-you-something-happy-to-distract-you-from-the-horrors-around-us stories. Zach never pushed for more, no matter how much he may have craved those tales of relative normalcy. The less Zach talked about them, the more that came spilling out of Joe.

Joe had only met her once before he started teaching. She had been five and, according to Joe, still in the 'pigtail' phase of life, so most of Joe's tales were secondhand from her dad. They were all probably embellished with Matthew's fatherly pride and Joe's admiration of a talented future agent, but it didn't matter to Joe. He told them because he needed to.

It didn't matter to Zach, either. He listened to them anyway.

He grew up with thoughts of a girl he had never met running through his head. While he never let himself fantasize about a normal life, his mother's impossible sanity or a father with a face and a name, Zach let himself think about the Chameleon. (The girl who could disappear; the girl who spent her summers in Nebraska but could fluently speak five different languages by the time she was eight; the girl who ate M&M's more than any other type of food, but still could run faster and punch harder than boys twice her age.)

It wasn't hard to avoid getting carried away. Thoughts of Cameron Morgan didn't hit him in the vulnerable part of his heart; it was like daydreaming about a character in a book. It was easy; it was simple.

(At first.)

He couldn't tell you when things started getting complicated. He wished the shift had come at a rational time, when he could reasonably justify thinking about her as more than a distant figure he could never meet and more as a person he wanted to know. He wished his feelings hadn't shifted at all; he wished he had never even known about her at all.

But wishing had never taken him anywhere useful, so he buckled down and bore it.

It would take years of gorging himself on M&M's before he admitted that his slightly obsessive taste for them was because she liked them, before he stopped pretending to ignore the lingering stares of civilian girls who didn't know any better and passed it off as 'something he didn't have time for'.

He was in denial until the very end. Until the truth was staring him in the face and was so obvious—neon-light obvious—that it just couldn't be ignored.

He liked her. Irrationally, hopelessly, foolishly.

And it only got worse from there.

ooo

A week had come and gone. The excitement in the fifteen boys who would be leaving for the Gallagher Academy was as palpable as the putrid smells emanating from the Blackthorne kitchens. Even though they didn't discuss it or acknowledge it—some of them didn't even think about it at all—it was obvious in the way they had a relentless nervous energy. They were prisoners who were all in on an escape plan, a flock of birds about to leave their cage.

As jittery as Zach was about leaving for Gallagher, the task he was given the day before the boys were due to leave was worse. Much worse.

The day was supposed to go like any other, the only difference being the fact that everything they boys would do—their drills, their runs, their training—was the _last_ time of the semester.

But when Grant Newman, Zach's roommate, started yelling at him to get up, Zach knew something was up.

"Zach, get your lazy ass out of bed," Grant bellowed. Zach put his thin pillow over his ears, but it was completely useless as far as sound-cancellation went.

Through his pillow, he heard Grant's last-ditch, "Solomon wants us."

That got him up.

Neither of the boys bothered doing anything to their appearances, aside from putting on shoes and, because they were feeling charitable, a breath mint. Clothes had never been a problem, because all Blackthorne had ever given then was a pair jumpsuits, meant to be alternated every other day. They were ugly, yellow, and unflattering as shit.

Still, it was no surprise that Blackthorne had ugly uniforms. Nothing about that hellhole was remotely beautiful, or even comfortable. Zach was almost eager for the promised tie/blazer combination he would have to wear at Gallagher, even if it meant combing his hair every day.

Grant led Zach to a small, almost-empty 'room' in the basement. There was the actual box-like building that made up Blackthorne—what the world saw—but the majority of the Institute was underground, tucked into the hundreds of tunnels spiraling off of caves and caverns. The room Joe was in was small and took twenty minutes to get to; by the way Joe leaned back in a ripped old chair, at ease, Zach knew it might have also doubled as Joe's hiding place when he went to Blackthorne.

He was almost tempted to ask Grant why he knew where Joe's secret meeting place was, but he resisted. Joe Solomon, as much of a figure he had been in Zach's life, was not his dad. He had no right to be jealous of anyone who knew something he didn't.

The two boys walked in, automatically ducking and squeezing themselves through the small doorway. Zach and Grant assumed their positions in front of Joe's chair; spine stiff and straight, eyes forward, hands behind back. It wasn't a stance they particularly liked, but it was all part of the military-like precision Blackthorne had beat out of them over the years.

"Zach. Grant," Joe said, not looking up. "I have a little something extra for you to do."

Joe was looking down at a file, idly flipping pages. He didn't even seem to be reading a single word, but Zach knew Joe was soaking it all in like a sponge.

Curious, Zach's eyes strained to read the file's name printed on the back tab, but Joe slammed it shut and stuck it under one arm before Zach could read a word.

"I know from personal observation that you two are the most talented agents in your class, if not this entire facility," Joe began, straightforward as always. His voice was all business, and Zach wondered if that day a week before had even happened. "Dr. Steve informed that you both have the highest scores in terms of marksmanship, physical abilities and endurance, as well as your skills in cover operations. This is all part of why I am asking you to do this."

Zach could have sworn Joe was looking at him during this entire mini-speech, and he resisted the urge to fidget or look away.

"Nothing about any of this—the exchange, what I want you to do today—is personal. It is simply an exercise, both for you and my students at the Gallagher Academy. In order for this exchange to work, you need to work together."

Grant nudged Zach—_work _together, he mouthed—but Zach ignored him and continued to stare at Joe. He didn't really see the sexual innuendo there, but Grant was eager to fulfill his role as a horny teenage boy and found one in everything.

"In order to do that, _Mr. _Newman," Joe said, giving Grant a mildly pointed look. Grant slipped his stone face back on. "You first need to size each other up. Discover strengths and weaknesses."

The boys nodded. None of this was anything new, so they knew that there was more coming.

Joe pulled the files out from under his arm, handing one to Zach and then one to Grant.

Once Zach saw the name on the file, he could have sworn his hands started to shake. He breathed in through his nose and out through his mouth, like he always did whenever he needed to calm down. Like Joe had taught him when he was eight.

"You will not be the only agents tailing these girls today," Joe continued. There will be two dozen other experienced CIA agents out there. They have not been informed of your presence, and -neither have your targets. What I want you to do—your mission, if you will—is simply to watch the girls. Observe their technique, their abilities. If you do happen to come into contact with them, you are free to join the other agents in their task and delay the girls as much as possible. They will all be headed to the ruby slipper exhibit at 5:00."

Joe paused, as if waiting for a Q&A portion.

"Are we to beak cover in any capacity, sir?" Zach asked. He was still clutching the file—the first _official_ file of hers that he had ever looked at without having to hack into hundreds of firewalls to get to it—and he felt his knuckles whiten. He looked up at Joe, at his unreadable expression. "If we are to have any cover at all, that is," Zach finished, hating the fact that his question was stilted, awkward.

Joe smiled. "No complicated covers, Zach. You're just normal teenage boys. And, as for cover breaking... You'll know when the moment's right."

Joe sat back down, and both boys knew they had been dismissed.

They turned and walked away. As they made their way through the winding stone halls, Zach heard Grant quickly turning the pages of his file. The name 'Rebecca Baxter' was printed on the tab; the picture of a beautiful girl with coffee-colored skin was pinned on the inside. Grant seemed to be soaking in every detail, making a series appreciative grunting noises as he closely studied the picture. Zach heard Grant mumble a perverted version of 'hot' under his breath in Korean, but Zach didn't comment.

His file was hot in his hand. He hadn't looked at it yet. He didn't want to. (He wanted to.)

He dropped it on his bed as soon as they got to their room and got dressed in their civilian clothes. Zach couldn't avoid the file forever, because he found himself looking at it in his hands as they rode in the helicopter on their way to D.C.

Her picture was recent. All the information was from mere weeks before. The other files he had hacked into, the ones with outdated information and pictures of her with braces and bad haircuts, had been years old.

(_She's pretty_, Zach mused. It was a quiet attractiveness, the kind that wasn't demanding and felt intimate. Like he had been watching while the world glanced over her because she wasn't strikingly tall or curvy or skinny.

In her picture, her eyes were gray and unreadable, her smile dutifully wide. It wasn't a real smile. He couldn't help but wonder what one would look like—a real one.)

"What are your subject's characteristics?" Zach heard Grant ask from the opposite bench.

His mind snapped back to the present, and he snapped the file shut like his thoughts had been splashed onto the page for the world to see.

"Cameron Morgan," Zach started, voice steady. It was a voice he had used hundreds of times throughout his life; he was calm, collected, and emotionless. "16 years, height 5''5, 120 pounds. Known pavement artist. Sophomore at the Gallagher Academy."

Grant rattled off similar facts about Rebecca 'Bex' Baxter, his subject. Despite the greenish tint of his face—motion sickness— his voice was similar to Zach's in its tone and rhythm.

"So, we'll be staying at the... Guggenheim Academy after this?" Grant asked, after he had finished talking about Baxter. "Actually _stay_ there?"

"Gallagher," Zach corrected automatically. He sometimes forgot that there were people in the world who had not grown up with stories of the prestigious Gallagher Academy, the talented secret agents they created and sent out into the world. "And, yeah, we'll be there for the rest of the semester. That's what Joe said."

"It's just weird to think about, that's all..." Grant trailed off. "Imagine what it's like. I'm sure it's a whole other world."

Grant's eyes glazed over at the thought. Mostly, Zach guessed, because of the whole 'girl school' aspect of it all.

Zach didn't' say anything. He had become an expert at ignoring Grant Newman over the years, so it wasn't hard.

"But, God," Grant said, glancing at Baxter's file again. "How_hot_ is she? And we get to spend an entire day watching_her._"

_And her partner_, Zach added in his head.

"What does yours look like?" Grant asked. His eyes were bright, like a kid with candy.

Zach begrudgingly handed over the file, and Grant opened it. His face fell.

"She is not as hot as the other one," was all he said.

Zach's jaw clenched. "That's your opinion, Newman. Can I have my file back?"

Grant looked up, shrugging. "I mean, she's not hideous or anything. She's just not..."

"Not _what_?"

Grant's brow furrowed, his look questioning. Zach tried to screw his everything back into a normal position; jaw relaxed, fists unclenched, heart rate back to normal.

"Not like Baxter," Grant continued, "Who... I mean, come on. She looks like the teenage Halley Berry. But Morgan here, she's..." He shrugged. "To be honest, I wouldn't notice her on my own."

"Her code name is 'Chameleon'. That's kind of the point, you perverted ass." Zach mumbled in Yiddish, yanking the file out of Grant's hands. Grant held up his hands defensively, a condescending smirk on his face, even if he didn't understand what Zach had said.

Besides lying, Grant seemed to be developing Zach's natural talent at half-baked, insincere facial expressions. Zach was an expert at bringing up the mask of smug indifference whenever he needed to, and even when he didn't. The last thing he needed was his roommate doing the same.

"So, you've got a crush, huh?" Grant sneered. He raised an eyebrow. "That will make this semester interesting."

Zach couldn't help but agree with Grant, on both counts. Still, he said nothing.

His silence must have answered Grant's question, because Grant crossed his arms and leaned back, stretching his legs out. Conversation over.

"Ten minutes, guys," the pilot called from the front. He was old Blackthorne alum, so he was usually stuck with the job of taking the Blackthorne boys all over the Eastern Seaboard. Zach and Grant were in the early stages of learning how to fly airplanes and helicopters, so it would be a whole semester before they could go on missions without calling sketchy-looking agents like their pilot.

Gathering up the file and his jacket, Zach sent quick, unnoticed glances in Grant's direction. Grant seemed to have forgotten about the whole 'crush' thing and was looking out the window, watching the D.C. skyline become clearer in the hazy winter morning.

(Zach resisted the urge to sigh in relief.

He would get his head together, from there on out. It was a mission and, as Joe had said, nothing about it was personal.)

The two boys sat in silence as the helicopter descended.

Zach focused on making his breathing even, his heart rate steady.

He looked to his partner, who nodded in confirmation of Zach's silent question.

Steeling himself, he opened the door. Blinding sunlight filled the cabin, revealing a black sedan and civilian-clothed agents at the doors. He couldn't tell whether they were Circle or CIA.

In the grand scheme of things, though, they were all kind of the same.

Zach took a deep breath, and started towards the car.

_Here we go._


	4. Chapter Three

_THREE_

According to Catherine Goode, Zach's first words had been a lie.

"You pointed at me and said 'pretty', you little shit," she cooed, pinching his cheek lovingly. Her mood had been so sweet, her smile so bright, that Zach hadn't been able to do anything but grin back, even if his cheek stung a little afterwards. "You've always known how to lie. Wonder where you get it."

Her eyes and gone hazy after that, and she had rose and gone upstairs, leaving a four-year-old Zach in the living room, alone, as thunder rumbled outside and shook the fragile walls of Catherine's old house.

She always seemed to go to places farther than her upstairs bedroom, because Zach was never able to ask her about her last comment. About where he got 'it'.

It didn't matter, one way or the other. Even if it wasn't the kind of lie he was meant to tell for the rest of his life, it set a precedent for how he was going to live his life. Regardless of whether he liked it or not.

His lies had as many faces as he did. They weren't just words that were carefully designed to conceal the truth, or words that spilled out like vomit, senseless and thoughtless in their approach. They were identities, personalities, covers, 'legends'. They were his curse and his lifeline.

Joe had been the one to teach everything about changing faces. Of course, Joe had been the one to teach Zach how to do everything—from reading to math to languages to the few chords he could pluck out on the guitar—but Zach knew that knowing how to change was the most valuable.

"It's all about the way the world sees you," Joe had said, voice low and patient, as he slipped on a wig and stuck a rock in his shoe. Seconds later, he had looked virtually unrecognizable as the Frenchman named Anton, and Zach had understood.

He became an expert at making up new versions of himself. He tried them out on everybody he knew—from Joe to Catherine to the other agents who came and went like the weather, but mostly Joe—and edited them as he went. He made up stories for each of his characters and gave them names. They had favorite movies and colors; they had families and inside jokes and friends.

"You've got it, kid," Joe would always say after Zach showed him a new accent to go with a new face. "But don't forget to be yourself for a while."

Zach would always nod, like he was listening so intently, so carefully. Joe was his mentor, so what he said was true, right?

It didn't take Zach long to figure out the downside of living as somebody else for so long; he forgot who he was before.

It was like a play. When everyone was gone and the stage-lights were down, Zach seemed to forget his lines. In his oblivion, his mind grasped and clawed at straws, trying to remember whether he had had any or not.

He had been looking for sixteen years and had yet to find himself. If he didn't soon, he knew he never would.

ooo

Of all the places to sit for a stakeout, Zach knew that benches were the least conspicuous.

Whatever bored bastard invented the pastime of sitting on a piece of wood and watching strangers in a public place must have had the practice of covert operations in mind, because Zach couldn't ask for anything better. It was perfectly acceptable for him and his roommate to wait there and watch as the world went by, looking naturally at ease in their comfortable civilian clothes as they leaned back in pretend leisure.

He owed a lot to that bored bastard.

Even if he didn't have a mission, Zach would have loved to spend a day on a bench at the Mall. People-watching was one of the few things he could say, with any surety, _he _actually liked to do with his time. It was one of the few things that he would have done regardless of what world he lived in or what he was expected to do with his life. Watching people—especially in a place with as varied of a population as possible—showed him the best of humanity.

(It was nice, after so many years of seeing the worst.)

Varied mixes, however, seemed less appealing to Zach as the day wore on. Especially since he was looking for somebody specific. He had to sift through middle-aged moms in track pants and teenage girls and boys on school trips, Russian speaking tourists and Japanese travelers taking pictures in front of the Lincoln Memorial. It was dizzyingly overwhelming, and Zach had to take a Tylenol and eat a half-bag of M&Ms before his head stopped pounding.

As unpleasant as it was, Zach knew he had the easiest job. The Gallagher Girls had to pick needles out of a haystack to find their tails, and the CIA had to constantly change everything about their appearance to blend with the crowd. All he had to do was sit on a bench and eat the candy he bought from a vending machine.

Beside him, Grant was blowing into his hands, rattling off details about their targets so they could 'find them and go back to Blackthorne.'

"... They will be in coats. Obviously." Grant huffed, burrowing deeper into his jacket."And their uniforms. That's what the file said."

"Do you know what color their uniforms are?"

Grant gave Zach a withering look. "I'm straight, dude."

"That doesn't matter. Color of clothing is all part of observation."

Grant made a petulant face and muttered under his breath about how 'Joe Solomon's damned protégée thinks he knows fucking everything', but Zach didn't really care at that point. He was too cold and too nervous and mightily regretting the M&Ms, as delicious as they were.

He wanted to _move_. He felt like running the length of the Mall a couple of times to get some of his damned energy out of his system. Maybe he could actually walk through one of the museums, like he always wanted to when he was a kid. Maybe he could highjack someone's car and drive as far away as he could. Maybe he could—

"Zach?"

"What?"

"I see them."

Zach resisted the urge to gawk around. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Grant staring straight ahead. Zach's roommate had plastered on a knowing smirk, leaning back onto the bench and crossing one leg over the other, slipping on his cover like a second skin. Zach, for once, followed his lead.

He casually leaned his elbows on his knees and, heart pounding, slowly slid his eyes over to where Grant was staring.

Their targets were thirty feet away, making their way through the crowds with the unmistakable certainty of operatives on a mission. Both of them were in their school uniforms, their plaid skirts undulating in the breeze.

Zach avoided looking at the girl in the red coat and focused on those skirts and wondering if his and Grant's future uniforms had anything to do with _plaid_.

(He dearly hoped not.)

"What do we do now?" Grant asked, barely moving his lips.

Zach watched the two girls walk farther and farther away, memorizing their pattern of movement, the way they interacted and gestured so he could look for it later.

Even from where he was sitting, in what felt like an entirely different world, Zach could tell that they were good.

But he would be better.

"We wait."

ooo

The initial contact was done.

(Sort of.)

Zach was relieved.

(Even if it wasn't really 'contact'.)

But they had seen him and his roommate, and looked at them, and obviously passed them over and categorized them as harmless.

(So that counted.)

He was relieved.

He hadn't really known what to expect, but he knew that Joe Solomon had been wrong. Whatever Joe had been expecting from Zach when he met Cameron Morgan, Zach hadn't done it.

(Even if he hadn't technically met her.)

"They walk really fast," Grant huffed three hours later.

Zach couldn't help but nod.

They were following the subjects from a hundred feet away. Right in front of them was one of the CIA all-stars, who had kind of thrown caution to the wind and was just running after them with everything he had left.

Zach didn't couldn't blame him. The Gallagher Girls were, he begrudgingly admitted, fast.

"Where are they going?" Grant asked after a while, slightly breathless.

Zach scanned the crowd, watching as two heads—one dark blonde, one curly black—disappeared as they went down the escalators to the underground train system.

"They're getting rid of their tail," Zach replied.

Once they were sure they wouldn't be noticed, the boys jogged through the crowd and elbowed their way to the escalators.

Once at the top, Zach and Grant paused. They panicked.

"Good God," Grant muttered, looking at the crowd below them.

Zach swallowed, suddenly nervous again.

Dozens of girls in white blouses—one that were nearly identical to their target's uniforms—were clustered on the escalators, gabbing and squealing as they all made their endless way down to the trains.

Zach's eyes frantically scanned the masses for any sign of a red coat but saw none.

"Hey, boys," one of the girls crooned. She waggled her fingers and smiled a 'come-hither' smile.

By the way his roommate was looking the girl up and down; Zach knew that the only thing stopping Grant from 'coming hither' was their mission.

"Hey... Ellie," Grant said, reading the girls nametag. She blushed and giggled, like it was_ just the cutest thing ever_ that he had actually made the effort to read her nametag.

"Hey, what's all this?" Zach asked, leaning on the moving belt that served as a handrail. "Are you all in a group or something?"

'Ellie' turned to Zach, eyes wide like she hadn't noticed him in the glare of his glittery roommate. He didn't even try his usual cocky smile and smirk to charm her, so he just settled for mildly curious.

"Oh, yeah," she said, making a dismissive hand motion. "It's just this... Thing, like, um..."

Zach nodded, still absentmindedly scanning the crowd.

Seven steps down, two girls were glancing at Zach and giggling. He paid them no heed, still looking for...

But then he saw their targets right _in front_of the giggling girls. Girls who were slightly taller different-cut blouses and forced ease as they leaned on the escalator railing. They stood straighter, with a palpable alertness that told him they were prepared for anything.

He instantly knew who they were. For a second, he almost felt like he was breathing after being underwater for five minutes.

"I see them," he muttered to Grant as 'Ellie' prattled on about their 'fake congress' conference.

"Where?"

Zach jerked his chin towards the two girls below, just as one of the others yelled 'let's make a run for it!' and the white blouses became a stampeding herd. Zach and Grant watched, apart from the fray, temporarily amused, as all of the fake congress girls sprinted onto a train just as it was pulling away from the station.

Standing still amid the chaos, it didn't take the Blackthorne Boys long to find who they were looking for; two girls, both slipping on their coats, walking away from the crowds they had disappeared into only minutes before.

Then, just a blink later, they were gone.

"Where'd they go?" Grant asked, his voice cracking slightly with barely restrained panic and exhaustion when they finally reached the ground floor.

"Under the escalator," Zach replied in a cool voice He resisted the urge to roll his eyes at Grant's overreaction but reminded himself that Grant—the son of a plastic surgeon and his second of seven ex-wives—had not grown up staking people out and predicting their movements. Zach knew that it was still very much a guessing game for Grant.

"So... Do we split up now?" Grant asked. Even if he complained about it under his breath, Zach was always the one who made the call.

They had twenty-five minutes left to do what they needed to do. It was divide and conquer time.

"Yeah."

"So..." Grant started walking away, looking over his shoulder at Zach, "I'll see you at the van?"

"Maybe."

Grant opened his mouth like he was going to say goodbye, then thought better of it and just nodded before he walked off.

Zach watched from a safe distance as Grant followed Baxter, fifty paces behind her as she made her way through the station. She seemed unaware of the fact that he was tailing her.

Zach sat at his bench and debated whether or not he should finish off the half-empty bag of M&Ms in his pocket.

But then he saw the other girl emerge from under the escalator. The girl in the red coat. Her stance was suspicious, her walk purposeful, and Zach had to restrain himself from running to catch up with her.

She was headed to the elevator, and he didn't think twice. He pushed the 'up' button before she could, greeted her, and went in when the door opened.

And before he knew it, he was in an elevator with Cameron Morgan.


	5. Chapter Four

**Hello, there. Thanks for all the love, you guys! Next chapter up next Sunday.**

**Disclaimer- I own nothing!**

* * *

><p><em>Chapter Four<em>

Zach was an expert at convincing the world that he was dispassionately non-emotional. In the minds of his peers at Blackthorne, he was like stone. The Circle saw him as the smug son of their leader, the one with the infuriating smirk and the ability to make their lives hell if he so desired because Catherine, as twisted as she was, still loved the brat.

He never cried in front of anybody, he rarely laughed, and the anger that he showed was kept so solidly in check that it was only visible in the whiteness of his knuckles, the clenching of his jaw.

He hated that he had to hide his emotions, even when they were real.

(Especially when they were real.)

There was so much of his world that felt like an illusion. A nightmare.

But the anger was real. It ate away at his insides, and the only way to keep it from exploding out of him was by hitting punching bags or running until his legs went numb and he was seconds away from passing out at the lack of oxygen in his lungs. The loneliness was real, too, and it was always with the sadness and bitterness. He was never sure what came first, but it always came all at once.

Even if his emotions, as few as there were, made his skin simmer hot enough to make steam, they were always kept in check.

But like anything else with that much pressure, Zach's explosions were inevitable.

It would have been better if he exploded like the rest of the Blackthorne Boys. If he beat someone up or yelled back at one of their temperamental instructors, if he was able to just snap and shoot someone or run away or even _cry_, Zach could have nearly called himself normal.

But he couldn't. Because when Zach combusted, it came in the form of panic attacks.

Heart-pounding, breath-stealing, vomit-inducing meltdowns that came out of nowhere, were caused by nothing and everything, and were completely paralyzing.

He usually managed to stave them off until he was alone, in his room. When he was still with Catherine in her big old house, the walls shaking with thunder and wind, he didn't know what was happening when he couldn't think, so would find the most secluded corner of his world and bite down on his hand. Hoping it would cover his screaming and keep his insanity hidden.

Because that's what it was, in his mind; craziness. He was crazy, just like Catherine, and he would end up just like her one day, and it scared him more than his inability to breathe during those unpredictable and unstoppable minuets of world-stopping confusion.

No one knew about it until Joe found him, shaking and sweating, when Zach was ten. Joe had been the first—the only—person to tell Zach to breathe, to put his head between his knees and close his eyes and just _breathe._

And it worked, for a while. It really did.

Over time, Zach learned how to notice the warning signs. How to breathe (in through his nose, out through his mouth...) without anyone noticing. He had to teach himself to control it. And he did, for the most part.

There were of course, the occasional bastards that snuck in. They were inevitable. There was one the on his first night of Blackthorne, then the intense one he had when he was fourteen, which was made worse by the fact that Catherine was there. _That_ one had been the first she had ever witnessed, and one of Zach's only memories of that day—aside from shooting a masked Circle prisoner, dropping the gun, and collapsing in a heap of panicked inhales—was Catherine's shrill voice demanding that Zach _stop it_and Joe _fix it_ and for someone to tell her _why the fuck you never told me you are a pansy who can't shoot a damn bastard in the fact without__hyperventilating!_

(That one had been the worst.)

But Zach was a professional liar. He was in control of his attacks, and even if he had stopped taking his anxiety medicine months before he ever walked into an elevator with Cameron Morgan, he didn't need them. He was in control. He was okay, he was okay...

ooo

...But as he stood in an elevator with Cameron-freaking-Morgan, he couldn't help but feel his heart rate increase.

He couldn't help but curse himself for not being more prepared.

The signs of his own stupidity flashed through his mind in neat, chronological order. How he had avoided the inevitable all day, had danced around her and her roommate like they were fire and he couldn't get burned. How he had nearly convinced himself into believing that seeing her across a thirty-foot distance would be enough to prepare him for the reality of meeting her, in person, where he could be close enough to her that he could smell her shampoo and notice that her watch was the same shade of red as her coat.

He had frozen, and he was paying for it.

It wasn't that he hadn't done enough research. He had passed the statues of limitations _years _before, as far as groundwork for a mission went. He knew everything he needed to know, everything he didn't need to know.

He was supposed to be ready, not be frozen. But he wasn't.

He almost wished he had taken those anti-anxiety pills Dr. Connors (the psychiatrist Catherine had demanded because she _didn't know who the fuck Dr. Steve was_, so she _demanded a professional who doesn't use his first name in his fucking title_) had prescribed him. Even if it had been months since he had last had any, taking one before the mission wouldn't have hurt.

Everything about that day was supposed to be easy. So simple, in fact, that the thought of taking any of his medicine had never even crossed his mind.

_Breathe, Goode,_ he chanted in his head as the doors closed. He hated using Dr. Steve's stupid technique of 'self-affirmation' or whatever it was called. It was all just stupid physiology shit, designed by people who had obviously never gone to a school that was actually a juvenile detention institution or lived in a world where death was a normal part of everyday life.

Still, he told himself to breathe. _Breathe._

_This is just a mission. Just_ talk_to her._

He leaned against the elevator railing, sticking his hands—which he had just realized were freezing—into his jacket pockets.

He pretended to nonchalantly glance her way, like he was absentmindedly looking at her in the cook way any stranger studies another stranger.

He didn't feel cool, though. He felt unprofessional, uncontrolled and just so completely out of touch with where his mission was supposed to be that he _knew_Joe would be disappointed.

He couldn't disappoint Joe. He had never managed to do so, and he wasn't about to start because of some stupid _Gallagher Girl_ and his inability to make light conversation with her.

(He was almost angry with her. Who was she, to make him freak out like that? Why did she possess that kind of power?

How had he let her gain it in the first place?)

His breathing under control, Zach opened his mouth. Willed sound out of it.

"So," he started, saying the first thing that popped into his head. His was voice clear and smooth, just as it was supposed to be."The Guggenheim Academy-"

"Gallagher Academy," she corrected, her voice flat, her response automatic.

"I've never heard of it," he replied, playing dumb.

"Well, it's my school," she muttered dismissively.

And that, according to Cameron Morgan, was that.

Zach decided to take her lead and let the conversation die off. This gave him time to make observations, which had obviously escaped his list of priorities in the first ten seconds of the elevator ride.

His eyes wandered to her reflection in the elevator door. He didn't need to be looking at her to notice that she never really stopped moving. It was the loudest thing about her. He could feel her impatience rolling off of her in waves; she tapped her foot, ran a hand through her hair, and crossed her arms, only to uncross them seconds later. All the while, she looked up at the slowly moving floor numbers as if they were the answer to some sort of ineffable life question.

It was strange to watch her, knowing that she was completely oblivious to who he was and how connected they were, even indirectly.

It was even stranger to know that the daughter of Matthew Morgan—the only man who had, according to Joe, ever even come close to bringing the Circle down—didn't run the other way the second she saw him.

(He was so used to people running. If she ever knew about Catherine, he knew it would be a matter of time before she did, too.)

If the way she was looking at him in the reflection of the elevator doors—like he had—was any indication, she was so completely unaware of who he was that Zach wondered if she even suspected him of anything besides being a normal guy who was terrible at small talk.

She wasn't even suspicious. The way she studied him was with the eyes of a normal girl looking at a normal boy, and Zach couldn't seem to decide if she found his appearance pleasing or wanting.

By the way her gaze flitted back up to the floor numbers, Zach figured it was the latter.

"You in a hurry or something?" he asked, the ticking clock of his mission—the unofficial mission he had taken upon himself to accomplish, despite Joe's orders to 'simply watch her'—banging around his head, loud enough to give him a headache.

"Actually, I'm supposed to meet my teacher at the ruby slipper exhibit. I've only got twenty minutes, and if I'm late, he'll kill me," she said in a rush, her eyes still focused on the floor numbers.

Zach suppressed the urge raise his eyebrows in surprise. Did she honestly just tell him every aspect of her mission, to a _complete stranger_ in an elevator?

God. Maybe she wasn't as _amazing_ as her legacy implied.

"How do you know?" Zach asked, eager to trip her up. He wondered how far he could go before she would remember herself and stop spilling her guts to him.

"Because he said, 'meet me at the ruby slipper exhibit.'"

Zach let himself smile as he shook his head. She obviously took things very literally.

"No, how do you know you only have twenty minutes? You're not wearing a watch."

"My friend just told me."

She was a good liar; he had to give her that. She just had to remember to lie more often.

She ran another hand through her hair, and Zach wondered if she was even aware of it.

"You fidget a lot," Zach said. Her forehead crinkled ever so slightly, like his observation had taken her by surprise, but smoothed out a second later.

"I'm sorry. I have low blood sugar," she shrugged, like it was her lifelong annoyance. She seemed to be an expert at being annoyed. "I need to eat something."

For the first time in their conversation, Zach didn't know whether to take her seriously or not. He wracked his brain for any information about health problems involving low blood sugar which, if it was a real thing, would have been included in her file. He didn't think it had, but he reached into his pocket and pulled out his crumpled bag of M&Ms anyway.

"Here, I ate most of them already."

She looked down at his offering, an unreadable expression on her face. "Oh, um, that's okay. Thanks, though."

Whatever. She wouldn't take candy from a stranger but would spill her entire covert agenda to the world. _That made sense._

"Oh, okay," Zach said, just as the doors opened.

Cold air rushed into the cab of the elevator and the sudden roar of people on the Mall—even though it was almost dark—nearly drowned out her 'thanks again for the candy' as she practically sprinted towards the Smithsonian.

He followed her. It seemed to be a precedent that had been reinforced as every hour of the day trickled by. Her leaving, him following. He hoped it wouldn't last past his mission.

It took forty seconds for her to confront him. Whether it was because she was ignoring him or unaware of his presence didn't really matter to Zach.

"Where are you going?" she demanded, whirling around to face him. Her eyes were wide with impatience and panic, puzzlement and annoyance, all at once. Her eyes told him everything.

In the fading light, he saw that they were green; the murky color of the Atlantic outside his window when he was little. He vaguely wondered why her eyes were grey in her picture, but green in reality.

"I thought we were going to meet your teacher in the wonderful world of Oz," Zach replied, tired of the pretenses but knowing he had to stick to it until 5:00.

"We?"

"Sure. I'm going with you," he said.

"No you're not!" She hissed, and there were more things flashing in her eyes—memories? Second thoughts about her response?—but he couldn't tell what they were. It was extraordinary, how many emotions she showed. It was either incredibly sloppy, incredibly brave, or all part of a brilliant-to-the-point-of-genius-cover.

The first of the list, he decided. She was starting to seem less like an agent and more like what she was meant to act like; a teenage girl.

"Look," Zach said, ready to shut down her little indignant act so he could go back to Blackthorne and go to sleep and forget about the entire day, "It's dark. You're by yourself. And this _is_ D.C. And, you've only got... Fifteen minutes to meet your teacher."

He didn't even know who he was playing anymore. His cover was shifting and changing with the moment, and he knew that, while improvisation was important, losing sight of who he was supposed to be could make everything fall apart.

It seemed to work, though, because she huffed a cross 'fine' and speed-walked the way she had been going.

"You walk really fast," Zach said after three minutes of practically jogging at her side. She rolled her eyes, and he made himself grin, even if he just kind of wanted to walk away.

Either she was having a bad day, or Cameron Morgan was just a bitch and he had been too eager to romanticize her that he hadn't noticed in her report.

He was tried enough to go for petty and decide that she was just a bitch. It was the least complicated way to approach the day, even though everything was far from simple as she escorted him to her meeting with Joe. The entire conversation was equal parts hilarious and disappointing.

"So, do you have a name?" he asked, wanting, more than anything, to trip her up more.

"Sure. Lots of them."

"Do you have a boyfriend?"

The question slipped out, seemingly out of nowhere.

"Look, thanks for the chivalry and all, but it really isn't necessary," she mumbled, looking like she felt guilty, even as she insulted him. "It's just up there, and there's a cop over there."

Zach glanced at the police officer, who was morbidly obese and sipping his coffee like he had nowhere better to be. "What? You think that guy can do a better job of protecting you than I can?"

For a second, laughter flitted across her eyes. They were blue in that moment, but changed back to green so quickly that Zach wondered if it was a trick of the light.

"No, I think if you don't leave me alone," she said, all sass and smugness, "I can scream and that cop will arrest you."

Well, then.

Zach stepped back, holding up his hands. He didn't want to bring the useless D.C. police enforcement into his mission, so he knew when he needed to quit.

Besides, it didn't matter.

He had already won.

"Thanks anyway," she called, almost as an afterthought.

Zach nodded in reply. He had suddenly run out of fake small talk.

Then she walked away.

But this time, she wasn't supposed to know he was her shadow.

ooo

Grant met Zach at the van. Zach's roommate was red-faced with exhaustion, but he was grinning.

"I didn't even need to do anything," Grant said breathlessly. Zach didn't bother to ask why Grant was out of oxygen as he climbed into the van and Grant continued on with a long-winded story about how Baxter had been followed by one of the CIA agents, so he hadn't even needed to talk to her at all. His job had just been to sit back and watch.

"What about you?" He asked, once his boring story was over. "I didn't get to talk to Joe. How did it go?"

Zach shrugged. He didn't feel like talking.

It didn't take Grant long to get the point and stop asking questions.

Later, they got into the helicopter in silence. As the blades began their hypnotizing whirring, Zach let his exhausted mind wander.

He remembered the surprise—the sudden understanding, like she had solved a mystery—on Cameron Morgan's face when he had stepped into the light at the ruby slipper exhibit; the pride in Joe's voice when he had said 'nice work, Zach'; how Zach had winked at Cameron Morgan, right before she had said '_Hi, Blackthorne Boy'_and the world had slowed down for a second or two.

_He had won._ Right?

But she...

How the hell had she known? Had she known all along, and just played with him like he had thought he had been playing with her?

Why was he so entirely confused about every aspect of his first encounter with Cameron Morgan?

It didn't matter anyway, he reminded himself. He just had to survive the semester, and then he could forget about her and stop his childish obsession and his stupid crush and the stupid, stupid, stupid expectations that she had simultaneously crushed and fulfilled, all at once.

"Did you meet her?" Grant asked an hour into the helicopter ride. His face was expectant, a smirk playing on his lips. "Did you meet your _dream girl_?"

Zach's heart rate increased. He didn't know why. He didn't feel like examining his barely-recognizable feelings. All he wanted was the second oblivion in his life, the peaceful one; sleep.

"No," he said. "I met someone who I thought was someone else, but she was just a bitch and not as pretty as her class picture indicates."

Grant's eyebrows raised a fraction. Zach didn't explain.

He closed his eyes and made his mind go black with sleep.


	6. Chapter Five

**Quick updates- Okay, so my account was doing weird things and three of the chapters got temporarily deleted, and it was weird, so. Yeah. I did not actually add a bunch of extra chapters; I just re-posted what was already there. Sorry for the confusion!**

**Also, I am going to be in my school's production of South Pacific. Updates are probably going to stay the same but, during show week, don't be surprised if they're a week late for a week or two.**

**Thanks for reading!**

**Disclaimer- I own nothing.**

* * *

><p><em>Chapter Five<em>

Zach had never been in a place as nice as the Gallagher Academy.

He had been in a thousand places, but he had never managed to be in any of the massive cathedrals of Italy, or any of the lavish palaces of old in Russia. Castles in Scotland were out of the question, lavish ruins in the Middle East were fairytales, and anything that wasn't directly related to the Circle and Catherine's whims was consistently out of Zach's reach.

It was enough to make him feel like he was living in a fishbowl. It was so painfully ironic, how he could literally be a citizen of the world and feel like he had never left the damp concrete walls that were the same on every continent.

Even if he did have anything to compare it to, however, Zach knew that the Gallagher Academy for Exceptional Young Women was not meant to be like anything else.

Even with its ivy-covered walls and towering iron gates, there was more in the air than old money and a carefully-maintained cover identity. There was more than the old legend, the pristine reputation; there was history and an utter sense of _belonging_ that surrounded the place like an aura, one that Zach had never encountered anywhere else in the world.

The girls belonged there. The teachers belonged there. Hell, even Joe Solomon belonged there.

It was enough to make Zach feel guilty for invading that ancient building. Even as he wore an itchy blazer with the Gallagher crest emblazoned on the pocket and a tie that seemed to choke him, regardless of how much he loosened it, Zach felt like an invader. Someone who was wearing shoes on holy ground; someone who was supposed to turn tail and never look back.

(Maybe he should have. Maybe he should have ignored Joe and his welcoming smile.. Maybe he should have climbed right back into the van that had driven them from where their helicopter landed; maybe he should have started running, unstoppable and without regret.)

Maybes were just part of his life, though. They came with the guns and the guilt and the adrenaline; they came with the danger and the constant reminders that his life was rooted in where it was, and probably would be forever.

Zach was used to the maybes. He was used to ignoring them.

So he pushed them aside. He crushed them to the ground under his freshly-polished shoes and, walking behind Dr. Steve into the front door of the school, he did what he did best; he became someone who didn't consider the maybes, who lied until he forgot about them and the version of himself that listened to them, however vague he may have been. He lied until the maybes vanished alongside all the other genuine versions of him that had ever existed, until all that was left was the smirk and the swagger and the person the world thought Zach Goode really was.

ooo

"Are those waffles I smell?"

"Yes, Mr. Newman," Joe Solomon chimed in, leading them to the doors that opened into what Dr. Steve fondly referred to as the 'the Grand Hall'. "Those are waffles you smell, but, seeing as how we are already running late, that is not why you're here."

Some of the eighth graders sniggered, but Grant cut them a look. They shut up and Zach resisted the urge to chuckle.

"In a few minutes, gentlemen, you will be announced to the whole of the Gallagher Academy. Shortly after, you will be escorted to your classes by either Dr. Steve or myself. Your belongings are being transported to your rooms as we speak. As a courtesy, Mrs. Morgan, the headmistress, wished to inform you that your bags are being searched, but only as a precaution. They do it with everyone, even the students and the staff, so you are not singled out in this safety measure."

The Blackthorne Boys didn't look convinced.

Joe Solomon gave them a wry smile, but didn't say anything else to confirm, nor deny, their suspicions.

With that, the doors opened.

A hundred teenage girls—all in uniform, mouths open in surprise—stared at the Blackthorne Boys like they were celebrities or parasites or just a strange combination thereof. Zach felt the eyes of a few girls raking over him, but he ignored them and looked to the podium. A woman he could only assume was Rachel Morgan continued on with an obviously rehearsed speech, despite the distractedness of her students.

"The Gallagher Academy for Exceptional Young Women has a proud history…"

She looked eerily like her daughter, Zach mused. Darker features and tanner skin, to be sure, but besides that, they had the same smiles. The same fidgety tapping of their fingers. The same voice, even.

At the reminder of the Chameleon, Zach's eyes automatically began to scan the room. As Dr. Steve made his way through the boys and down the aisles made of the long banquet tables the Gallagher Girls were seated at, Zach crossed his arms and assumed a relaxed posture. He leaned a hip against a table and looked around the room, like he had nothing better to do.

Finally, he spotted her.

"Ladies, this is a wonderful opportunity…" Rachel Morgan continued. Zach had stopped listening, along with the rest of the students in the room, long ago.

She was looking straight at him with what could have been a look of pure hatred, confusion, or another odd wave of knowing. Like she had been expecting the boys, even though Dr. Steve had told them that they would be a surprise for the girls.

Cameron Morgan seemed to have a talent for knowing what she wasn't meant to.

It was mildly impressive. Still, she was not very careful about whom she trusted; she had been sloppy. He had beaten her, the famous Cameron Morgan, and he held onto that fact with everything he had.

He felt a smile tugging on his mouth, against his will, as she stared at him. The other girls sitting around her—Baxter, Grant's target; some politician's daughter whose name Zach couldn't remember; some tiny blonde pixie person—glanced between the two of them with knowing looks, but Cameron ignored all of them.

She looked away first, and then Zach did, too.

"Welcome to the Gallagher Academy, students of the Blackthorne Institute," Rachel Morgan finished, her voice rushing back into Zach's head like a sudden wind. Her eyes seemed to land squarely on Zach with a look he couldn't read, much like one Gallagher Girl had given him the day before, but they were lasers that told him, in no uncertain terms, that she knew everything about him. And she would be watching him. "I hope you enjoy your time here."

ooo

"So, we meet again."

Zach hated using corny lines, it was the first thing that popped into his head.

Emotions flitted across her face like shooting stars, the final one—a pinched expression that consisted of a raised eyebrow and wrinkled forehead—the only one that ever seemed to stick.

They were standing in the middle of the crowded hall. All around them, Zach felt the eyes of the other Gallagher Girls on him. The majority of them seemed to have forgotten about the initial uncertainty about having the boys there, because they bumped into him like he was some sort of celebrity that they just _needed_ to touch, and he could hear their giggles echoing in his head long after they were gone.

It didn't take a genius to know that these girls were boy-starved. Zach knew that he could have his pick, if he wanted any of them.

But he didn't. They were all, from what he had been able to gather in the few hours he had been at Gallagher, as readable as books. They were nothing like him, and they would be just as disappointed as everyone else who found out who he was under his dozens of covers.

He knew it would be the exact same story with the Chameleon.

And yet, he hung around her. He sat behind her and roped her into being his guide around the school.

He could have easily told himself that asking her to be his guide was the sensible thing to do, regardless of who she was. From what he had read in her first semester report (the one about the townie and her exploits to get to him), she seemed to know the place better than anybody. The secret passages, at least.

He could have told himself that he just liked to annoy her. She reacted to every obnoxious smirk he gave with delicious little huffs and eye rolls, and she snapped at him like a pro. She was pissed about the day before, obviously, and her indignant act was a constant reminder that he—despite her little moment of having the upper-hand—had _won._

(For once, though, he wanted to be truthful with himself.

He wanted to know her, and to figure her out. She was confusing and contradictory and easy to read and completely cryptic, and if he was going to spend the rest of his semester at a place that required him to wear the tightest tie and stuffiest blazer known to man, he wanted to be doing something useful—like solving the puzzle that was Cammie Morgan.)

"So _this_ is the famous Gallagher Academy?" Zach mused, glancing around at the massive space around him. It was all very old, which made it all the more imposing.

"Yes, this is the second-floor corridor…"

Zach didn't know how long she talked with that tourist-guide voice of hers, but he didn't really care. He just watched her and tried to overlook the fact that one of the more ambitious Gallagher Girls had pinched his ass in passing.

"And _you're…_The famous Cammie Morgan."

Her nose wrinkled at the way he said her name, and he felt his smirk turning into a smile. He had never used her nickname before, and it felt strange. She looked at him like she wasn't used to people knowing who she was, people knowing her legacy, and he found it odd. In his head, the whole world knew about Cammie Morgan.

"Come on," she said after another few seconds of staring from her and jostling from the other Gallagher Girls in the hall. "Culture and Assimilation is on the fourth floor…"

Wait, what?

"Whoa," he said, "Did you just say we're taking _culture_ class?"

Zach didn't know whether to be amused or disgusted or completely pissed that Joe Solomon did nothing to prepare him for this.

Still, he felt a smile creeping onto his face. Cammie—because that's who she was now, in his head—looked exasperated.

"_Yes_."

Grinning, Zach said, "Boy, when they say you've got the toughest curriculum in the world… They _mean_ it."

She rolled her eyes.

They turned down a hallway draped with lavish fabrics and little couches scattered all over the place, like any of the Gallagher Girls were prone to fainting and they needed a couch near them at all times.

He looked at Cammie—still confused about her in so many ways—and wondered how tough she and these other girls really were. Because, as far as he could tell, the school really _was_ a palace for princesses.

She turned back to him, caught up in her lecture. Her face was completely serious as she said, in her best tourist-guide voice, "Culture and Assimilation has been a part of the Gallagher curriculum for more than a hundred years, Zach."

(She said his name a lot. He didn't want to admit it, but he liked that.)

For a moment, Zach almost let himself be convinced by the conviction in her eyes, the sternness of her voice. He was almost ready to forget how much his tie was chocking him and how hot his blazer was and how ridiculously out of place he felt in that place built for people who opposite him in every way.

But then he heard, from a voice like cotton candy in the other room, "Today, ladies and gentlemen, we will be studying the art of… the dance!"

Memories of everything he had been taught at Blackthorne—torture, coping skills, long-range kills…—flashed through his head. The feeling of being in an alternate universe rushed back to him, and, by the look on Cammie's face, he knew he couldn't resist this opportunity.

"Yeah… Life. And. Death."


	7. Chapter Six

**Happy reading! Disclaimer-I own nothing!**

* * *

><p><em>Chapter Six<em>

Despite the fact that all of them had been through hell and back, together and apart, the Blackthorne Boys had never truly been a unit. It was always survival of the fittest, and the boys—even if they weren't exactly happy about it—did their best to keep it that way.

None of them had ever become friends. They didn't keep in touch during their summers or after they finished their time at Blackthorne; they rarely talked about anything but what was for lunch while the Institute was still in session and, if they did talk about home or anything that was worth anything, they went right back to growling at each other and using their mutually perfect right-crosses to mark their favorite seats in the mess hall the next morning, regardless of any connections they made have made the night before from discussions about their collectively shitty lives.

It was a lonely life. Zach felt the aching emptiness acutely, the pain sharp enough to make him nauseous every other day. He missed talking to people, especially Joe; he missed being able to feel the world pulsating around him, even if he couldn't get to it because he was locked in a Circle headquarters with Catherine the Great Bipolar Psycho and a bunch of Circle thugs.

Maybe that was why Zach tolerated Grant and his bull-headed insistence that he and Zach become friends.

It began in seventh grade, when Zach first came to Blackthorne. He had been nervous as hell, shaky with memories of the mixed stories he had heard about the place. It was the first time he was without Catherin—technically a good thing, but he was still leaving all he had ever known. The worst part was that Joe wouldn't be there to guide him through the unknown.

As Zach had unpacked his meager duffel bag and tried to find a halfway clean corner of the room that would serve well as his make-shift library for the few books he brought (which had quickly been confiscated and Zach had never seen again), he had eyed his roommate warily, remembering everything Joe had told him about Blackthorne.

"Things are changing there, Zach," Joe had said with a definitive nod of his head. Like he would _make _it be that way, no matter what. "It will be okay."

None of it was okay, though. The place was cold and fluorescent and eerily like the cement basements that had taken up the majority of his childhood 'homes'.

Also, Grant, his new roommate, was annoying. Really annoying.

"Hi, I'm Grant!" he had chirped, smiling with his too-white teeth and his too-dark-to-be-natural-tan. "And you're…?"

"Zach," Zach mumbled, monotone.

"Cool," Grant said, doing that awkward nod-thing that Zach would come to recognize as Grant's automatic way of filling up silence when he didn't know what to say.

They had never had a truly meaningful conversation since, and Zach planned on keeping it that way.

Even if they had something in common—the potential to be friends—Zach wouldn't have taken the bait. It wasn't worth it, because he knew how Grant's story would end and he didn't want a front-row seat.

Zach knew that Grant, like the majority of the boys who finished their time at Blackthorne, would become an assassin. Even if that was what they were technically trained for, there was always shame in the boy's faces when they signed contracts with rouge governments and made agreements with terrorist organizations. Because of the Circle's heavy involvement with Blackthorne—half of Zach's instructors were agents who knew Catherine—many of the others joined them as well. If there were any left who actually managed to wiggle their way into a respectable government organization, they were usually double agents and spent the rest of their lives in a constant state of paranoia.

It wasn't always this way, according to Joe Solomon. Twenty years ago, when he went, it was a respected institution. It wasn't nearly as grueling, and there were more actual classes and less hour-long, loosely supervised sessions at the shooting range with a sniper rifle.

Twenty years ago, it was a place that trained actual agents, and that was where he wanted it to be once again.

But Zach knew the reality of the situation, and, even if he had wanted to try and start the change by making friends and exposing his peers to Joe Solomon's version of the covert world—the 'right' one—he didn't want to live with the knowledge that he had done all he could to change their minds and they had gone the 'wrong' way, anyway.

He had to live with enough, he figured. Adding that on would be too much.

ooo

The first week at the Gallagher Academy was a strange one for the Blackthorne Boys.

First there was, obviously, the foreign presence of girls. Girls suddenly permeated every aspect of the boy's lives, from what they talked about to what they dreamed about. Girls were in all of their classes, all their meals, and the majority of their thoughts. Girls, the boys observed, smelled really nice, giggled whenever Blackthorne Boys were around, and completely managed to surprise the boys at every turn, even if they did nothing but act like _girls_ all the time.

For example, it should have been easy, the boys figured, to get them to partake in, ahem, _special activities _(or, as Grant called it, '_little talks _between classes'), but—while some of the boys had had past experience with flirting and were slipping into their old habits like pros—most of the Blackthorne Boys were unable to even talk to girls, let alone flirting with them. The fact that the girls were adamantly nun-like in their interactions with the boys, as far as _that_ went, didn't help either.

Needless to say, it added a whole new dimension to their worlds. Whether it was good or bad remained to be seen.

Secondly, the boys were experiencing—for the first time since seventh grade and beyond, for some—a formal school setting.

There were teachers that they had to call 'Mr.' or 'Mrs.' or, in Dabney's case, 'Madame', there were three extra hours that were devoted to actual homework, and their futures suddenly depended on grades and not on how far they could shoot a target or how long they could make another boy pass out without actually killing him.

There were no more grueling morning drills, no more sweaty jumpsuits that were the most obnoxious shade of neon. There were blazers, sure—with ties that the boys were constantly tugging on, and shirts that never seemed to stay tucked—but it was a small price to pay.

But the strangest thing about that week was that the Blackthorne Boys, hostile as they had been in the past, became a unit.

They sat together at the meals, during classes, and talked about things that were stupidly irrelevant to anything that would further them in their separate but similar career pursuits; they got to know each other. They talked about sports and the girls and how fucking delicious the waffles were.

None of them talked about how they didn't belong there, and how they all felt like they were living on borrowed time. Like any moment, they would wake up and it would have been the strangest dream they ever had, but also the one they would have wanted to return to the most.

None of them had to talk about it. For once, the boys were all in sync, and they all keenly felt the differences between the Gallagher Academy's teaching intentions. They knew how noble it all was, compared to Blackthorne.

"You are all very lucky to be able to attend this excellent scholastic institution, gentlemen!" Dr. Steve chirped every morning, at the daily 'team meeting' they had in their common room.

The boys would always nod, like they knew it all too well.

And they did, in a way.

They just wouldn't let themselves get too comfortable.

Zach, especially. He was ready to fight it—the full feeling in his stomach every night, the laughter he shared with the other Blackthorne Boys, the looks Cameron gave him that were gradually becoming more puzzled and less hostile—for all he was worth.

On their second Monday morning at Gallagher, however, Zach wasn't feeling ready to fight anything. He was paying for his five o'clock run, and he was resisting the urge to yawn as Dr. Steve continued on about how the boys needed to 'engage' and 'take mental notes for the future because these people, gentlemen, are _legends_ and _excellent _at what they do'.

Beside him, one of the boys was mumbling a sordid tale of his attempted (and subsequently failed) conversation with a single Liz Sutton, Cameron Morgan's waif-like genius friend to Grant, who was half-asleep and barely listening. Zach was pretty sure the skinny kid was a sophomore named Jonas, but he couldn't be certain.

Zach thought the entire story was hilarious, and, by the way the corner of Grant's mouth kept twitching, Zach's roommate thought so, too.

"So we finished talking about the architecture of the building, and then I asked her where she got her acne cream, 'cause she's got really nice skin and I wanted to know, but she got really red and huffed like she was mad and walked away and I honestly don't know what I did, really, Grant_, I don't_."

An eavesdropping eighth grader in front of Jonas turned around a sniggered, and Jonas gave a defeated shrug.

"I honestly don't. Really."

The eighth grader smirked and turned around, but not before Grant gave a sound kick to his chair.

"Anything wrong back there, boys?" The nasal voice of Dr. Steve called. Jonas' eyes went wide with panic, but Grant gave a confident smile and a shrug.

"Sorry, Dr. Steve. The younger ones just don't know when to shut up."

Dr. Steve narrowed his eyes at the eighth grader, who shrunk in his chair. Grant, Jonas, and Zach covertly fist-bumped each other before Dr. Steve adjourned their 'meeting' and allowed the boys to go get ready for the day.

Later, on their way to the Grand Hall, Jonas resumed his therapy session with Grant. Zach deciding that enough was enough, turned around, walking backwards in front of them.

"Jonas, I've only had one girlfriend and even I know that you never, ever ask a girl about what kind of acne cream she uses."

"But—"

"No matter how nice her skin is. She's a girl. She's supposed to have nice skin. You're not even supposed to assume that she uses acne cream, because that means that you know her nice skin is not natural. It's a pride thing."

Jonas' eyebrows furrowed, puzzling over this advice. Grant was smiling smugly at Zach.

"I thought you had never had a girlfriend, Goode. Why have we never heard about her?"

Zach's smile faltered. He turned around, but Grant was determined.

"How hot was she, on a scale of one to ten? Also, her boobs… What size? Because that could determine my opinion of you until graduation."

Zach shrugged Grant off, sprinting ahead to the doors. He quickly got in line for breakfast. He heard someone come up behind him.

"Grant, I am not going to—"

Joe Solomon stood behind Zach, a rare smirk on his face. "Tell me what, Zach?"

Zach immediately took stock of the people around him—Gallagher Girls, faculty members—and decided that it was best not to tell Joe anything about anything. Too many people around to hear.

"Nothing."

"Oh, right."

Zach didn't reply and grabbed a plate at the end of the long table.

"So, Zach," Joe said, going through the line behind Zach. "I haven't had a chance to talk to you since you've arrived here. How you been?"

Zach knew he couldn't say anything close to the truth, so he just kind of nodded and pretended to be really agonizing over the choice of bacon or sausage.

"Fine," he mumbled, choosing the bacon. _Always_ bacon. "It's been fine."

Zach finished getting food first, and Zach didn't realize he was waiting for Joe until he felt his mentor's presence at his side. He didn't realize he had spent that time staring at Cameron Morgan until Joe asked him, in a voice to quiet only Zach could hear, what he thought of 'Ms. Morgan'.

Zach didn't say anything. There was nothing to say.

She was rumpled from sleep, her hair messy and her eyes sleepy. She was laughing at something one of her friends said, absentmindedly picking at a cinnamon roll. She looked relaxed, like she utterly belonged where she was, and Zach felt jealousy rising up in his chest.

It was easy to feel resentful of the Chameleon. It was less sticky than liking her, which seemed like his only other option.

"She's fine, Joe," Zach muttered, knowing he needed to fill the silence. "She's just fine."

"She knows you're looking, Zach."

"I know."

And he did. He barely met her eyes in the orange juice pitcher she was using as a reflective surface, but her gaze slipped away before their eyes could meet.

Even without looking at her, Zach could see it all in the way she sat; the tension in her shoulders, the way she was suddenly aware of every move she made because she knew she had an audience.

In his time at the Academy, Zach had made great leaps in his mission to solve the puzzle of Cameron Morgan. All he needed to do was discover that she wasn't really a puzzle, not to him, and the rest came easily.

She was a girl who belonged in one place in the world, who was confident in few things. He had invaded that place and beat her at what she was confident in, and she didn't like him because of it.

She wasn't a bitch, and was only really hostile towards him, and it made his throat ache with something he didn't want to place.

Because he liked being around her. He liked dancing with her in C&A, and listening to her comprehensive and intelligent answers during CoveOps and COW. He liked seeing her smile around her friends and hug her mom in between classes, when she thought she had time. She ruffled her hair in this way that always made him want to touch it, and eyes that did, in fact, change colors with her clothes and emotions. He liked realizing that he was one of the few people who knew how to read her.

She may have hated him—or at least disliked him—but it didn't matter because those years of reading her file and listening to those stories were catching up with him. Fast.

"Get in control, Zach. It won't get easier until you do."

With that, Joe walked away. Zach watched as Joe took his seat beside his missing best friend's wife, which Zach thought endlessly ironic. He felt like yelling across the room and saying so to Joe, but that urge faded as soon as it came.

Zach wondered if Mrs. Morgan knew.

As much as he resented Joe Solomon sometimes—for pushing him too hard, for being everything but exactly what he needed—he didn't envy his mentor's place in life.

Zach walked back to Blackthorne's (unofficial) table and took a seat beside his roommate, who was talking about Baxter and how she had positively reacted to his new nickname, 'British Bombshell'. Jonas gave the freshmen help in their PHD-level physics, while the eighth graders were having arm wrestles over who got to date Macey McHenrey, once she stopped threatening to kill them all with baseball bats.

It was the Blackthorne Boy's central state of normalcy, Gallagher edition.

Still, Zach hadn't found a new place to fit into. Even if it was only the illusion of belonging, like the one the rest of the Blackthorne Boys had found, belonging eluded Zach as much as it always had.

Zach looked down at his plate, no longer interested in watching the people around him. He watched the bacon instead, which was significantly less interesting, and as good as it looked, he wasn't hungry anymore.

"I'm leaving," he mumbled.

"Uh, okay. See you first hour," Grant said, looking him over.

Zach knew he wasn't having an attack, but he hated that Grant was looking at him like something was wrong. Like everything that was messed up about him was tattooed on Zach's skin.

"Um, dude," Grant mumbled as Zach gathered up his uneaten breakfast, "Are you okay?"

Bristling, Zach snapped, "What's it to you, Newman?"

Grant raised an eyebrow, mumbling a 'sorry' that Zach barely heard as he walked away.

ooo

Zach ended up in front of Mrs. Morgan's office, for some reason.

The door was locked when he tried it. Even though there were no print-activated security systems or eye-scanners anywhere, Zach knew that he shouldn't even try to jimmy the lock. He would get in trouble, first of all; it was wrong, second of all.

He didn't even know why he was there. He was the last person in the world who would have any reason to break into Rachel Morgan's office.

Despite this, he was pacing in front of her door when Mrs. Morgan herself walked up, keys in hand, surprised expression on her face.

"Mr. Goode? What can I do for you?"

He opened his mouth as if to reply, but nothing came out and he just ended up feeling like a fish out of water, gasping and unable to speak.

She smiled wryly and gestured for him to move. She was much shorter than him—shorter than her daughter by an inch, at least—but he moved out of her way. As much as he respected her, he feared her more; getting out of her way was probably the best course of action in any situation.

He followed her into an office filled with lots of aged leather books and chairs. Bookshelves lined the walls, stacked with first-editions and espionage chronicles; there was a surprising little corner of the room with a minifridge and a hotplate.

Zach's attention, however, strayed to a group of pictures on the desk. There were the smiling faces of Mrs. Morgan and her sister, while others were of Matt and Cammie and Mrs. Morgan in infinite combinations and situations.

His favorite was of Cammie, when she was a kid and in a ninja outfit for Halloween. Her smile was big and toothy, with little gaps here and there from missing teeth. Her freckles were more prominent, her face rounder and, in the picture, her eyes were that pure blue color that Zach had come to associate with Cameron's true smiles and rare belly-laughs.

"How old was she in this picture?" he found himself asking.

Rachel looked up from her desk, where she was organizing files. She smiled wistfully, her eyes sparkling with the memory. "Cammie was six," she replied. Her grin widened, and he felt himself smiling in return. "She knew that spies don't have a specific outfit, because they always have to blend in with the people around them, so she went as a ninja so she would have an excuse to use her new martial arts moves."

Zach chuckled, shaking his head. "Started her early, huh?"

Rachel scoffed. "No, her Aunt Abby was just eager to get her in trouble with the other kids at school."

Zach raised an eyebrow in question, but Rachel held up a hand, signaling that those stories were for another time.

Looking back at her files, she asked, "How can I help you, Mr. Goode?"

Zach sat down in one of the wing-backed chairs in front of her desk. They were chairs that belonged in a mobster movie, not the office of a spy-boarding school headmistress.

Nervously running a hand through his hair, Zach stalled to give himself time to think. His knee was bouncing with nerves and restlessness, but Rachel looked at him as if she truly wanted to know what was on his mind and that, whatever he was about to say, would be valid.

It was the complete opposite of the way everyone had been looking at him for the past week, and it was slightly disconcerting. Still, he wasn't complaining.

"Why did you let me in here, if you don't trust me?"

She had looked back at her files, but her head jerked up with the question. He was just as surprised as she was, but he didn't show it.

"Pardon?"

Zach leaned forward on his elbows, suddenly _needing _to get answers. "Look, I know you don't trust me. That's okay. Most people don't. I have a psychotic mother and history of hanging out with the worst kind of people and, even if it's not exactly pleasant, I understand why people don't trust me."

Rachel's eyebrow was furrowed, her dark eyes confused. "Yes, Mr. Goode, but…"

"I just want to know why you let me in here, despite all that. Why I was one of the students chosen or asked or whatever selection process you used to pick who would come here."

Rachel leaned back in her chair, her expression pensive. Then, "What did Joe tell you, before you came here?"

"What do you mean?"

"When he announced it, what did he tell _you_ about it? Anything about why you were going to be one of the fifteen to attend?"

_I wouldn't be in here asking if he had_, Zach thought. He knew better than to sass her, though.

"I just…" Zach started, faltering. "I just kind of assumed I was going, because Joe was the one telling us about it. If it was anyone else, I wouldn't have, but…"

Rachel smiled, giving him understanding and sadness. "I see."

Zach nodded, not sure what to say next.

"Look," Rachel said. She pressed her lips together, like she was steeling herself. "At this point, I have to say that no, I don't trust you."

Zach's stomach dropped.

"If it is any comfort, Mr. Goode, I am not distrustful because of the fact that you have been involved with the Circle of Cavan. That was not your choice, and I feel more sympathy for you than distrust, on that account. However," she continued, her eyes growing cold, "I do not trust you because of the fact that you have, in the past, gone on missions for the Circle that were not, according to Joe Solomon, forced upon you by Catherine Goode and her superiors. I… I know that this may have been necessary, at the time, to do whatever you have done for reasons that I will never fully understand. Survival is the strongest of any of the voices in our heads. But I love my daughter and my school more than I have ever felt sorry for you, so you must know that, if you ever pose a threat to any of those girls outside this office, I will kill you with my bare hands and it would not be pleasant, I can assure you."

Zach's hands were shaking in his lap. He didn't know when that started, and he clenched his jaw in concentration, willing it to stop.

"I thought I was here to build friendships. Make allies."

It took her a second to realize it was a joke. A tentative smile crept onto her face.

"Just show us your worth, Zachary," she said, using his name for the first time, "And we will all believe in you. You just might end up being one of the kids that I would kill for."

Zach chuckled, trying to lighten the mood. He hadn't counted on her big speech, and his hands were still shaking as a result. Class was going to start soon, and he wanted to be back to who he was supposed to be before he had to be around Gallagher Girls for seven hours.

"Well, wouldn't that make me the lucky one?"

She smiled again, but it still held a warning.

Walking him to the door, she said, "Joe has told me a lot about you."

"Really," Zach said. It wasn't a question, because it didn't surprise him.

"Yes. He said you were smart and talented. A good spy, a good person."

Her gaze leveled him.

"I trust Joe more than I trust nearly anybody else in the world. Don't prove him wrong."

With that, the heavy oak door closed in his face.

Zach still stood there five minutes later, hands—no longer shaky—in his pockets. He was vaguely aware that he had forty seconds to get to his first class, but his attention suddenly landed on a yellow post-it note on the door.

_How long has that be there?_ Zach wondered.

He recognized Joe Solomon's writing immediately.

_Zach—meet us at the CoveOps classroom first hour. Bring a coat. While you're at it, stop trying to seduce the Morgan women. _

Zach laughed out loud, the feeling foreign in his chest, before he stuffed the EvapoPaper post-it in his mouth and, smiling to himself while ignoring the memory of Rachel Morgan steely gaze and cold words, Zach walked away.


	8. Chapter Seven

**So sorry this is a week late, you guys. I had a lot of trouble with this one, for some reason, so I had to rewrite it 4-5 times before I got it where I wanted it. So, sorry about that. ****Also, announcement-I have read the sixth book and slightly edited the chapters before this so they go along with the history that's revealed there. There will NOT be any major spoilers for the sixth book in any other chapters, just little ones. Honestly, I really didn't have to change that much, so there's not that big of a difference, but they're changed, just so you know.**

**Happy reading! Next chapter will (hopefully) be up in a week.**

**Disclaimer- I own nothing!**

* * *

><p><em>Chapter Seven<em>

Sufficiently jacketed to survive the weather, Zach met the CoveOps group in the front of the school. Once everyone—all sophomores taking the CoveOps track, regardless of what school they actually went to—was accounted for, they all piled into the ruby red shuttle van.

Zach and Grant sat on each side of Joe at the front. Even with the uncertainty of a mysterious mission and the danger of being in the same van as fourteen Gallagher Girls, Zach felt surprisingly calm about the whole ordeal; Joe was there.

Dr. Steve, their driver, was droning on about how well Solomon had trained the Gallagher Girls and how they _all need to listen to him_. Yes, Zach had to admit that it was true, but anything coming from Dr. Steve automatically seemed annoying, like a frequency that was high enough to hear but not notable enough to pinpoint and eliminate.

In the back of the van, the presence of Gallagher Girls—one in particular—hung heavy in Zach's mind. He didn't know where Cammie Morgan was, exactly, but he felt the palpability of _her_ pulsating through his system.

As Mr. S**o**lomon gave them the details of their mission—"Today's about the basics, ladies and gentlemen"—Zach used the rearview mirror to see what Cammie was up to. Her eyes were on the back of Joe Solomon's head, constant and calm. She wasn't fidgety this time; her hands were steady; her knee didn't bounce like Zach's was; it was all a blatant reminder that Cammie Morgan, as human as she had always been to Zach, was a spy to the core.

"I want to watch you move; see you work together," Joe continued. "Pay attention to your surroundings, and remember—half of your success in this business comes from looking like you belong, so today your cover is that you're a bunch of private-school students enjoying a trip to town."

Zach thought the reminder of the cover thing was a bit redundant, but he knew Joe liked to make things clear.

"What are we really?" Zach heard a girl ask from the back. He elbowed Grant in the side, knowing it was Bex Baxter—the strong British accent, the powerful way her voice carried—and Grant grinned.

Joe turned around, facing the back. "A bunch of spies playing tag," Mr. Solomon explained, smoothly taking a quarter out of his pocket and flipping it to Bex, which she caught.

"Brush pass, Ms. Baxter," Joe said. "Define it."

If it was anyone but Joe Solomon, Zach and the rest of the Blackthorne Boys would have rolled their eyes. Some of them had been working during the summers, or even before that; brush passes were part of how they lived, not just a lesson from school.

Still, it was Joe Solomon. The fact that he was teaching it_ meant_ something, so they all sat straighter. They listened.

"The act of covertly passing an object between two agents."

"Correct. The little things can get away from you, ladies and gentlemen." Joe's gaze raked over the kids in the van, and Zach felt Joe's eyes stay on him a beat too long. "The little things matter."

"So right you are," Dr. Steve chirped, eager to put in his two worthless cents, but Joe continued on. He had never liked Dr. Steve, and Zach knew that Joe's new vision for Blackthorne didn't include it's barely useful psychologist-headmaster.

Zach couldn't agree more.

"Pair off," Joe finished after giving a few more instructions. They had reached their destination but sat in the stopped van as the girls pinned comms and cameras to their coats, the boys sticking them in their ears. "Blend in, and remember, we'll be watching."

Cammie Morgan had been looking around, her eyes searching the van for Baxter, but Zach had already claimed her. Albeit unofficially, but that was beside the point.

Joe knew and, barely restraining his smile, he said, "Oh, no, Ms. Morgan. I believe you already have a partner."

Zach expected a withering look from the Gallagher Girl—an annoyed sigh, a snappy comment—but her face remained cryptically blank. She shrugged, mumbled, 'okay', and climbed out of the van.

He was reading her wrong. He needed to think like a spy, and think of her as one too; he needed to predict her movements, not her emotions, and he would be much better off for it.

Ignoring Grant's not-so-subtle nudge as he opened his door, Zach climbed out of the van and into the light.

ooo

"Come on, Gallagher Girl, this should be fun."

She didn't exactly look like she agreed, but Zach didn't let that dampen his day.

Despite the chilly wind, it was a beautiful day in Roseville. The sun was out, the sky was blue, and it was the kind of day the Blackthorne Boys had come to crave. They weren't outside much, besides for drills and runs, and the weather in Maine wasn't exactly known for being _sunny_, so Zach knew that it was a treat. Rachel Morgan's office from an hour before felt like a million miles away, so he was going to let himself enjoy it, even if Cammie refused to do the same.

Stretching out on the gazebo steps—the gazebo, Zach remembered, Cammie had used as her dead-letter drop with the townie the semester before—Zach squinted up at Cammie. With the sun behind her, she looked golden. Her eyes were a muddy sea green and looking at him like relaxing in the sun was the strangest thing she had ever seen him do.

He didn't blame her. He hadn't let himself relax much in the time he had been at Gallagher, so it must have been a strange sight, indeed.

She hadn't said anything yet, and the space felt empty. In his ear, Zach heard the chatter of all the other Gallagher Girls over his comms unit as they talked about school and the merchandise in the store windows facing the square, but Cammie stayed quiet and alternated between giving him a puzzled look and gazing at the town surrounding them like it was a land from a dream that she hadn't wanted to leave.

He needed to say something.

"So, come here often?"

Her nose wrinkled in exasperation. Maybe it wasn't the right thing to say, but it was something.

Her expression cleared and, deadpan, Cammie said, "I used to, but then the deputy director of the CIA made me promise to stop."

Zach laughed the obligatory laugh, and she gave a small smile in return.

"Okay, Ms. Walters," Zach heard Joe say through the comms unit, "You're it. Be aware of your casual observers, and let's make those passes quick and clean."

Zach grinned, knowing that Joe was loving being the puppeteer, as two of the Gallagher Girls—Trina? Tina? And who was the other one? Eva?—passed each other on the side walk, a bare brush of their palms the only sign that something had been passed.

"Well done," Joe said. The two girls grinned to themselves, and Zach marveled at how the entire world wanted to impress Joe Solomon, regardless of who they were.

The sun was warm on Zach's skin, making him feel sleepy. He closed his eyes and let the silence settle around him, and he almost forgot that Cammie Morgan was standing above him, starting to move and fidget like she was supremely uncomfortable.

She must have been, because she said, "So what about you? Exactly where does the Blackthorne Institute call home?"

Zach bristled at the mention of that place. Cammie didn't seem to notice, simply looking at him like he _owed_ her an answer.

"Oh," he said, raising an eyebrow in what he hoped was an enigmatic way, "That's classified."

She huffed in exasperation. "So you can sleep in the walls of _my_ school, but I can't even know where yours _is_?"

Zach laughed again, but it was a hollow sound. Memories of Blackthorne—the damp cold that never seemed to go away; the complete lack of anything warm and homey; the sight of dozens of mannequins mutilated and slashed to pieces, victims of the boy's training, soon to be actual humans—flashed through his mind.

The girl above him was strong, yes; he had been in enough P&E sparring sessions to know she had a solid round-house kick. She may have even known some of the same things he did; they might have been taught in a different way, but it all boiled down to the same techniques, however noble the intentions of the agent may be.

Still, she was small and delicate; muscles may have run through her arms, but they tapered down to wrists that Zach could break with a single snap.

She might have been a Gallagher Girl—_the_ Gallagher Girl—but she would never be ready for the world Blackthorne exposed.

"Trust me, Gallagher Girl," he murmured. "You wouldn't want to sleep in my school."

"What do you mean?" She fired back. "Why can't you tell me?"

Zach didn't have the words she wanted to hear, or even the ones that would have shut her up, at least. He sat up, leaning his elbows on his knees. "Just trust me, Gallagher Girl," was all he had, and it felt infinitely inadequate. "Can you trust me?"

In the comms unit, Joe was telling the Gallagher Girls to tighten up their technique. The wind was blowing through the deserted square, ruffling Cammie's hair, and Zach's gaze never left hers as he waited for her answer.

And waited.

And waited.

Her silence was his answer, so he stopped waiting and decided to clear the air.

"Solomon's good," Zach said. The statement felt redundant, but Cammie nodded anyway. She wasn't looking at him anymore, her green eyes instead scanning the square around them; noticing things, calculating the odds… Searching for something.

"They say you're good, too," Zach said.

It was the truth, regardless of how rusty she had been on that first day. From the sad crinkle in her forehead, the lost way her shoulders curved under her apple-red coat, Zach knew she was still broken up about the townie.

As much as he may have not liked to admit it, Zach knew she already had plenty of men in her life; adding in another one, and a delinquent at that, wouldn't really be helpful for the Chameleon.

Before she could say anything back, Joe said Zach's name though his comms unit. "Without turning around, tell me how many windows overlook the square from the west side."

Zach's mind flashed through the images he had subconsciously collected; it was an easy question with an easy answer, one that he supplied in seconds.

"They say you're a real pavement artist," Zach went on, his eyes locking with hers once more. "You know, it's probably a good thing we got to tail you in D.C. If you'd been following me, I probably never would have seen you."

It was the most truthful thing he had ever said to Cammie Morgan, and Zach felt slightly proud of himself for telling her that. Her skill was obvious; one bad day, he had realized after his first few weeks at Gallagher, was not any way to judge anybody.

Still, despite the intended compliment, Cammie didn't give him one of her rare smiles. She didn't chuckle and joke with him, or even get angry and annoyed with her.

She shut down—face stony, shoulders stiff. She walked away without another word, leaving Zach on the gazebo steps. Alone.

"Gallagher Girl?" He called, rising from the steps. At the sound of his voice, she started to run.

From the growing distance between him and his partner, Zach watched as Cammie bumped into Bex, receiving the quarter and a smile from her friend. Noting the hand she held the quarter in—her right—Zach stayed back as Cammie stole down a side street, her legs eating up the pavement with a confidence Zach had already seen on her so many times; like she knew exactly where she was and where she was going.

It wasn't until she passed the pharmacy that Zach realized just what she was doing.

Peeking around the corner like a detective in an old crime TV show, Zach watched as Cammie hesitated at the door. There was a boy looking through the window as she walked by, and Zach recognized the way the boy's face lit up when he saw her; the way he tucked it all back in when he walked outside, a hesitant, "Cammie, is that you?" ringing in Zach's ear like a bell.

Zach saw how Cammie stopped and stared, going pale like a ghost. Her mouth dropped open, and everything about her just seemed to freeze.

And yet, even from thirty feet away, Zach saw her eyes; they were a pure, celestial blue.

At the sight, everything in Zach froze, too.

"Cammie, are you okay?" the boy asked. Cameron's mouth opened and closed, soundless, and Zach tried to remember what the kid's name was. He had read the report enough times—it was something he should have known.

"Hi, Josh."

Oh. Right.

"What are you doing here?" 'Josh' asked, sounding much too hopeful for his own good. Cameron's mouth opened again, preparing herself for her line, but Zach turned and stopped listening before he could see any more.

She had left him out in the cold, so he would do the same.

"Zach," Joe's voice said in his ear. "Zach, get back in there."

Zach looked around the square, watching the other Gallagher Girls for reactions. This was on comms, so they could hear this, right?

"It's a temporarily private signal. You're okay."

Zach nodded.

"Get back in there, kid," Joe said. "She needs you for cover."

Zach glanced back over his shoulder, barely noticing that there was another girl who had joined the happy couple. Even though the other girl was clutching the townie's arm like it was a life raft, he still leaned toward Cameron like a willow tree in a storm. She did the same.

"She's with who she wants to be with, Joe. She doesn't want me there."

Joe sighed, annoyed. "Zach, that's an order. Get over yourself and go save your partner or I will be failing you for the rest of the semester."

Zach's face scrunched in disbelief. He opened his mouth to protest, but Joe-who was still mysteriously _somewhere_, unseen by Zach—cut him off.

"Go, Zach."

ooo

Zach didn't talk to her at all until after dinner. He doubted she wanted to talk to anybody, let alone the one person who witnessed her conversation with her ex in person.

And besides, what purpose would it serve? All he had witnessed was her interacting with a civilian; revealing that he knew and felt more than he was supposed to would be as pointless as her conversation with the townie whose name Zach couldn't remember. Giving the incident weight by asking her about it would be destructive for his cover, her pride, and just about every other aspect of his fragile alliance with Cameron Morgan.

So he didn't talk to her. He was planning not to talk to her, because it would have been best not to talk to her. It would have been a smart thing not to talk to her.

Still, he felt like he needed to prove something to himself. Maybe even Joe Solomon and Rachel Morgan, if Zach couldn't think of any other way to justify following Cameron Morgan through her dusty secret passageways after they were both finished with dinner and everyone else had gone back to their rooms for the night.

Which is exactly what he did.

Justified or not, Zach trailed behind the Gallagher Girl as she walked, almost in a trance, down a hall that ended at a huge red tapestry. An intricate tree was embroidered on the luxurious red velvet, golden names entwined into the branches.

It seemed to be Cameron's destination, because she stopped in front of it, tilting her head up and wrapping her hands around her elbows like she was cold.

At that moment, she looked smaller than she ever had. She looked deflated, like encountering the townie had made the air come out of her in a single _hiss_.

She surprised Zach, though, when she stepped forward and fingered the ancient tapestry. She almost seemed to be pulling it back, away from the wall, when Zach interrupted her.

"You know," he said, his voice blessedly smooth, "I don't think I ever got the rest of my tour."

She whirled around, eyes wide. All of her walls were down, and Zach saw everything in eyes that had turned green in the time after she had talked with the townie; her loneliness, her alarm, her embarrassment.

"So what do you say, Gallagher Girl?" Zach asked, hooking a finger behind the tapestry. When he peeked, he saw nothing but stone. It wasn't really indicative of whether something was there, but he knew he would never find it on his own. He was genuinely curious, but, despite his question, he knew his true tour would have to wait until another day. "Is this when I get my Cammie Morgan no-passageway-too-secret, no-wall-too-high tour?"

Her eyebrows rose in surprise. "How do you know about…"

Zach pointed to himself, feeling like it was necessary to remind her that he was, in fact, a "Spy."

He crossed his arms, leaning against the wall. Hoping he could make her feel more at ease, if that was even possible.

_(What am I trying to do here_? He asked himself.

There didn't seem to be an answer.)

Deciding to address the elephant in the room, Zach said, "So. That was Jimmy?"

"Josh," she corrected.

"Whatever," Zach huffed. It didn't really matter, anyway; it was one of those annoyingly wholesome, embarrassingly common names, anyway. If he just went off the list—John, James, Jimmy—he would always get there eventually. "He's a cutie."

She rolled her eyes, Princess Indignant again. "What do you want, Zach? If you came to make fun, go ahead." She raised a defiant eyebrow, laying it all out on the table. "Mock away."

Zach studied her, fighting a smile, wishing she wasn't so damn likable. "Gee, you know, I would… but you took all the fun out of it."

"Sorry," she mumbled sarcastically, moving to walk past him.

Zach stepped in her way. He wasn't ready for her to leave. "Hey, why did you freeze out there today?"

She looked up at him, studying him in a way that felt all too familiar; like she was unsure how to respond to the question because her answer depended on who she was talking to.

(Which version she was talking to.)

Zach's ability to change faces was advanced, borne of years of experience. He was the boy of a thousand faces, and, in his world, that was something that would take him far.

But here was someone who he wasn't supposed to know or associate with, who was a victim of the evils of his world and possible collateral damage if she got too close. Someone who didn't trust him, was in love with someone else, and would run the other way the second she knew all there was to know about Zachary Goode. Someone who Zach wanted to be real with, as crazy and terrifying as it was.

Zach wished he had a single face behind all the others, one that he could save especially for Cameron Morgan whenever she looked at him the way she was at that second.

Zach wished a lot of things. It was useless to dwell on them.

"I'm fine," she said. It was a flawless lie. "I'm over it."

"No you aren't, Gallagher Girl," Zach replied. He hoped he sounded reassuring as he said, "But you will be."

Zach didn't realize he was holding his breath until she smiled, shaking her head ruefully. It was the first real smile he'd gotten from her all day, and it made him smile, too.

"Yeah, well…" She trailed off, shrugging, as she looked down at the stone floor.

Zach stepped back by the wall, unblocking her path. He knew when a moment was over.

"Good night, Gallagher Girl." He winked, slipping back into his legend.

She gave another small smile and slipped past him, almost to the end of the hall as he shouted, "But not too sweet!" after her.

Her laugh echoed off the stone walls, making its way to him with the clarity of a bell, staying with him until he closed his eyes and dreamed, for the first time, about eyes as blue as the sky.


	9. Chapter Eight

EIGHT

When Zach was little—really little, back when he lived with his mom in the old house by the sea—they had listened to the Beatles a lot. On CDs, walkmans and records, the last of which were all vintage and left over from her dad's collection. She seemed to enjoy the fact that she acquired them from her dead father more than she actually liked owning them.

"Even though he died of a heart attack, Zachy," she would say every time she sat down on the floor with her records spread around her, petting the stained cases like _they _were her children and the little boy sitting on the floor in front of her was simply a ghost from her head, "I think God killed him so I could have his records. Or maybe I killed him… Indirectly, of course. Maybe God listened to my prayers and killed him _for_ me."

She would go on for a while, repeating in the same cycle, humming under her breath between rounds as she arranged and re-arranged her collection on the floor. She would hiss at him if he ever came too close to any of the records, so Zach learned early how to stay engaged with her while hiding in the corner, away from her stinging slaps and grasping hands that left bruises on his arms.

It was always on Sundays, her Beatles time. It was Catherine's equivalent to church; she never said as much, but Zach knew that was the case.

She would burn candles, placing them around the barren living room with meticulous precision, as if the gods would strike her down if they were a millimeter out of place. Sometimes, she smoked strange plants that made her eyes go hazy and her smile soft. She sang along to every song—ever word memorized by heart, not a syllable out of place—in a clear voice that carried to all corners of the house. Zach once told her she should have been a singer, thinking it would make her happy. She had narrowed her dark eyes, her voice dripping with venom as she had said, "There are lots of things I should have done, Zachary. You stopped me from doing most of them, so it's not very nice to remind me and make me regret keeping you, now is it?"

When they left the old house by the sea, Catherine left her Beatles records. They were under a floorboard somewhere in the second floor, where she stashed so many mysteries Zach never wanted to know. She had seemed okay with leaving the records there, but Zach knew her. Once the music was gone, she was more faded than ever. She didn't hum or sing; the last human piece of her, savage as it was, had died.

Zach was almost sad to see it go.

He had never been much of a music lover, especially not as much as Catherine. There wasn't much value in it. It was noise, a distraction that could lead to broken concentration and shattered covers. Even if music made his mother human for an hour or so, Zach didn't care. He would make himself less human if it meant being less like his mother.

Besides, refusing music—especially the Beatles'—didn't seem to matter. The music stayed anyway.

They were folk songs, like the one about the knight burning down the castle. They were classic rock choruses and opera arias in different languages. He couldn't sing worth a damn, so the melodies stayed trapped in his head like his mother was still holding the puppet strings. It was proof that she would never be out of his head entirely; he would always be just a little bit crazy.

When he met Cammie, the music changed. It also got annoyingly corny. Fast.

The music that popped into his brain, unbidden, was the Beatle's. It was 'Hey Jude' and 'Something' and 'Across the Universe' and 'Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds'. Sometimes, during class and Dr. Steve's lectures and the buzzing Grand Hall at breakfast, Zach wanted to cover his ears and scream. He would watch her as she walked to and from classes, or make brief eye-contact with tight smiles, and John Lennon would be crooning in his ear. Zach would grit his teeth, turning away from Cammie and walking the other way, but he still heard the music.

He wanted to ask her why the music had changed. She would probably knee him in the groin and tell him to get his shit together.

After the mission to Roseville, he knew it was time to start taking his anti-anxiety medicine again.

It made him feel fuzzy, but the music had finally stopped.

ooo

"I have never worn a tux before."

"Seriously, Jonas? Never?"

Jonas shrugged his skinny shoulders. His eyes were wide with panic as he stared at the garment bag. He poked it with a tentative finger, jumping back like the black bag would bite him.

"It's not a wild animal, Jonas," Grant droned, deadpan, as he unzipped his own bag.

"Just because you grew up in these things, Newman, while doing God knows what," Zach said, unzipping his own bag, "Doesn't mean you can be condescending."

Grant rolled his eyes. "Look who's talking."

Ignoring Grant, Zach's eyes surveyed the tux. Even after a week of taking his medicine again, his mind was still fuzzy. He couldn't seem to remember all the required steps to putting on a tux.

It was the night of the big formal (or 'comprehensive exam', as the teachers were calling it). Their classes had been dominated by girls chattering about hair and makeup; their tuxes had been delivered in record time, along with shoes that Dr. Steve had ordered them to polish.

From the other side of the school, the boys could hear distant yelps and other sounds that vaguely resembled torture. Even if it was just girls obsessing about the spy school equivalent of prom, Zach still flinched at every scream.

The boy's prep had been far less extensive. All Zach really had to do was dress in the damn tux and comb his hair.

He was calm as he buttoned his shirt and shone his shoes. His heart was steady, his hands still, and Zach didn't know whether to be relieved that the medicine was doing its job or angry that the one thing keeping him calm was the vacuum that stole his genuine emotions, however inconvenient they would have been.

Joe talked about catch-22s that popped up like daises, and for the millionth time Zach fully understood what he meant.

"Word is that the sophomore girls have had arm wrestles to decide who gets to dance with me," Grant boasted, breaking into Zach's thoughts as he expertly tied his bowtie. He wasn't even looking in a mirror. "I bet your Chameleon was one of those, Goode."

Zach shook his head, avoiding his roommate's eyes as he glanced in the mirror and combed his hair. "She's still with the townie, Newman. There's no need to try and make me jealous."

_ "_Now whoever said that was my intention, Zachary Goode?" Grant sassed, hands on his hips like Mammy from _Gone with the Wind_. It had been Catherine's favorite, but Zach had still loved the story.

Before Zach could reply, a voice from the other side of their door—Dr. Steve—called, "Boys? You ready?"

Jokes set aside, Grant finished pulling on his tuxedo jacket. Jonas nervously ran a hand through his tight-knit black curls, which got caught and set them back two minutes because Grant had to untangle Jonas' fingers while Zach surveyed the spotless rooms for equipment they might need and had forgotten.

Deciding they were ready, Zach opened the door, letting in a flood of sound from the Blackthorne Boys waiting in the common room. As the rest of the boys tugged on their bowties and shirt collars, eyes wide with equal parts terror and excitement, Zach couldn't help but feel older and more seasoned, like he had years on these boys. With his hands in his pockets and an easy smirk on his face, he looked the part; in his fuzzy head, there was nothing but the mild observations that were automatically collected but soon discarded. He barely felt different, only aware that his calm was abnormal.

He was ready to see Cameron Morgan in formal wear.

Without a word, he led the company through to the door leading to the hall. The Blackthorne Boys followed like a funeral procession.

"Spread out," Zach barked, his voice carrying authoritatively. "Enter at varying times. I don't want you all there at once."

The boys nodded, some of them dropping back while the rest continued forward.

Zach and Grant were part of the group that hung back. They were in a secluded hallway, so they knew none of the staff of Gallagher Girls would walk by them and ask why a group of Blackthorne Boys were loitering in the hall, doing nothing when they should have been downstairs. The boys all leaned against a table or the wall, the go-to position of operatives who only want to _appear_ at ease even if they were anything but.

They were silent, but the air was heavy with the weight of their nerves and the continued disbelief that this fairytale was their world. Even though they had been there for almost two months, the reality of this temporary life still hadn't sunk in. With any of them.

Zach closed his eyes, blocking out the faces of his fellow Blackthorne Boys.

For a moment—the briefest, infinitesimal part of a second—Zach dimly wondered about Cammie. Was she even going to be at the test? He had been there when DeeDee, Jimmy's gal-pal, invited Cammie to their prom thing. He had seen the barest hint of longing on Cammie's face, the way her eyes rolled upward, as if she were weighing to pros and cons of breaking the rules for her ex. The way the townie still looked at her was palpable, and Cammie hadn't been any more cryptic than he had.

It had all been so completely obvious to Zach, and the remembrance of it made him glad he was heavily medicated. He didn't know how he would react if she had gone to Roseville and he wasn't in control.

"Zach?" Grant suddenly whispered at his side, quiet enough so only Zach could hear.

"Yeah?"

"I… I'm not ready for this," Grant mumbled, shamefaced. He wasn't looking at Zach but at one of the random suits of armor the school used as decoration in the halls. "I… I'm just not ready."

He said nothing else, but it was enough.

Zach was usually good with words and what to say when it needed to be said. But at that moment, with the strange rich boy who had ended up in a world he hadn't asked for, Zach didn't have the words. He felt useless and numb. He might as well have been dead.

For lack of anything better to say, Zach told his roommate the truth.

"Me too, buddy. Me too."

ooo

Zach saw her first.

He had been one of the last Blackthorne Boys to make his way to the Grand Stairs, which swept down in a graceful arc. Everything in this school was Grand with a capital 'G' and the Blackthorne Boys thought it was hilarious. Zach thought that, yes, it was pretentious, but it was all part of the package. It was a place that deserved the word.

Lingering at the top of the stairs, Zach leaned his elbows on the railing and looked out over the party. All he was seeing was the foyer, but if Zach hadn't known the mansion better, he would have sworn that the foyer was actually the Grand Hall. Below him, glittering Gallagher Girls and tux-clad Blackthorne Boys talked and tentatively flirted, jumping out of the way as harried kitchen staff power-walked through the crowd and to the open doors that led to the Grand Hall. There was a buzz of excitement. The air vibrated, and Zach felt even more like a ghost as he stood there and felt nothing but a weariness that ran deeper than medication. It had weighed down his bones for sixteen years.

He stood there for what felt like hours, scanning the party below him and the halls to his right and left. Eventually, he lost interest and started scanning the area around him—the halls, the corridors-for some(one) he wasn't willing to name.

But then he noticed the girl standing fifteen feet away, looking over the party like she had never seen anything so golden.

Gazing at her, even in his clouded state, he had to agree.

She was wearing red, which surprised him. Her coat was red and she wore red shoes and scarves, but evening dresses made the choice of color so much more prominent. He had expected black or blue or green, something neutral and more in her comfort zone.

Yet there she was, in a shade of red that reminded Zach of London phone booths and apples, and it made him smile.

She looked good in red.

She leaned her elbows on the railing, still unaware of his presence, and Zach let himself watch her for a little while longer. His eyes wandered over her slender neck, her exposed shoulders, her sweeping skirt and nervously tapping fingers. If it wasn't for her fidgeting—constantly messing with her dress, tentatively touching her hair like it was a wig that would fall off at any second—Zach would have almost believed it was someone else. Yet another girl he avoid, yet another life he could ruin.

But it was Cammie, and Zach was too medicated to worry about mentally justifying a simple conversation with a beautiful girl, so he walked over to her—cocky, smirking—and said, "Well, you don't look hideous. Downright stunning, in fact."

She turned to him, barely surprised at his sudden appearance at her side. Her eyes were gray, and she was all business as they raked over Zach, assessing his attire like an agent would; checking for authenticity, how well it would make him blend or stand out, depending on the mission. Still, there was a flicker of hesitation there. She didn't know whether to take his comment as a compliment, so she seemed to be cool and said, in a flat voice, "Ditto."

She took a step forward, but tripped before she could move any more.

"Easy, Gallagher Girl," Zach murmured, taking her elbow as he registered that he had, in fact, been watching her closely enough to know the exact moment she had been falling and how to react to stop it.

"I am perfectly capable of walking down the stairs by myself," she snapped, wrenching her arm away. Zach didn't want to, though; she smelled like her apple blossom shampoo and a new perfume that made him want to bury his face in her neck and live there forever.

"A lady always gracefully accepts a gentleman's arm when offered, Cammie dear," Madame Danbey whispered, floating by as she snapped pictures of the kids with the brooch clasped to her scarf.

Looking up at Zach, Cammie sighed like it was such a big chore to take Zach's arm.

Taking her arm, Zach was realizing how ineffective anti-anxiety medicine was around girls like Cammie Morgan. His emotions, long repressed, were popping back up, and it wasn't necessarily a good thing.

And yet—as Zach gazed down on the party, Cammie's arm warm through his—Zach felt himself grinning.

As far as Zach Goode's life went, this was probably the best it would ever be.

"Stop it," he heard from beside him.

"What?"

"You're enjoying this way too much. You're smirking."

They reached the bottom of the stairs. He turned to her, his grin widening. "I got news for you, Gallagher Girl. If you're not enjoying this, you're in the wrong business."

Her face scrunched in thought as she looked at the hall around them and seemed to realize that, yes, a night of dancing and food in fancy clothes might not be the absolute worst thing ever.

She looked back up at him. A tentative smile was creeping over her face, and Zach felt his whole body getting warmer as her eyes changed from gray to that unattainable blue. Maybe it meant nothing—this shift in emotion, from business to happiness—but Zach was hazy enough that rational thinking wasn't exactly his specialty.

Suddenly, Cammie looked over Zach's shoulder. He turned, watching as Joe Solomon made his way through the crowd to Cammie and the group of sophomores that seemed to follow her wherever she went.

"Hello, ladies and gentlemen," Joe started, reminding Zach that his mentor was on a legitimate mission here, "You all look very nice, but I'm afraid you aren't quite finished getting ready. I'm afraid we didn't mention that tonight is something of a masquerade ball.

"But we haven't got masks, or disguises, or—"one of the sophomores started, buy Solomon cut in.

"These are your disguises," Joe said. "Cover legends, ladies and gentlemen…"

There were more questions—mostly from Liz, the Kid Genius—before Joe finished with his trademark 'this is serious shit, kids' looks.

"…Tonight isn't about knowing the answers, ladies and gentlemen." Joe looked from face to face, lingering, as always, on Zach. His look at the small space between Zach and Cammie wasn't subtle in the least, so Zach shuffled to the side. Just to appease Joe.

"It's about _living_ them."

On cue, all the sophomores—now including Zach's roommates and Cammie's friends—looked down at their files. Zach's school picture was there, along with a cover description, identity and personality identifiers, and a detailed history. Zach was an art thief. He was there to case the joint, but he was only serving as he front man. He was covering for all his other 'partners' who were casing the place in secret.

Zach chuckled. Considering the fact that he had been the mastermind behind various Circle and Blackthorne plots, Zach knew that Joe had hand-selected these covers.

Zach looked up at Cammie. Her forehead was creased in concentration, her lips moving as she read the file. It was mildly adorable, and it made Zach smile.

But in the back of his head, he heard Joe's warning. His own common sense and mental control, clouded by medicine that was being excessively counter-productive. His mother's voice, singing a haunting song; _nothing's gonna change my world. Nothing's gonna change my world._


	10. Chapter Nine

NINE

The rest of the night was more blurred than an Impressionist painting. Time had never been so elastic; one minute, he was dancing with a girl pretending to be an art curator, while the next minute he was slithering through conversation with his undercover teachers, only to be pulled away by another girl three seconds later. The fuzziness his medicine had given him earlier was wearing off, bit by bit, and Zach was free-falling into night's splendor. He laughed with the other students and danced and ate and drank and bulshitted with like the best of them. He was an international art thief—a notorious one at that—and a ladies man. He talked Dutch masters and feigned looking down the dresses of teenage girls, smirking and pretending that his eyes weren't darting to the girl in the red dress that hadn't moved from her place at the wall in five minutes.

It was lies on lies on lies. In formal wear.

Taking a moment to breathe, Zach grabbed a glass of champagne, not bothering to check whether the students were allowed to drink or not.

"Isn't that technically illegal, Mr. Carson?" He heard from his shoulder. He felt the beat of recognition pass through his system—he was Henry Carson tonight—and turned to Rachel Morgan with a smirk that was part of every legend he had ever taken.

"The night is young, Madame First Lady," Zach soothed, slipping an arm around her waist with the hand not occupied with champagne. The jealousy of the other Blackthorne Boys was hot on his neck, but Zach had dived headfirst already. "… And so am I. What does a little champagne matter? Besides, you are French_, ma Cheriè._ When have you ever balked at the young enjoying what they are entitled?"

Zach spread his arms wide, as if he could embrace the whole sparkling ballroom. He could practically see the pain she took not to roll her eyes—but when he set aside the champagne and held out his hand, the headmistress took it.

"I thought I told you to stop seducing the Morgan women," Joe said, brushing past the pair as they walked to the dance floor.

"I'm not that strong, Joe," Zach called. Zach heard Joe's retreating laugh.

"Is this a problem you face often, Mr. Carson?" The headmistress murmured, her smile dangerous under the elegance of her cover. They joined the waltz mid-step, effortlessly slipping into the fray. "Fawning over women you're told to avoid?"

Zach quirked an eyebrow. If he wasn't dancing, he would shrug. "Only with the ones I find truly irresistible… Like yourself, Madame."

She rolled her eyes but chuckled nonetheless. "Jesus, you're slick. Joe has trained you well, I see."

"In being smooth above everything else? Yes, Madame, he has."

The conversation ebbed, Zach's eyes darting to the other Morgan woman in the room. Still at the wall, sweet-talking Mr. Moskowitz, but he knew she was watching him. He could feel it in his skin.

When he turned back to Rachel, her smile was smug. He wondered if the headmistress was telepathic as well as inhumanly beautiful.

The waltz came to an end and the audience applauded the string quartet. Headmistress Morgan curtsied and murmured her goodbyes, leaving an utterly transparent Zach on the floor.

He found the champagne flutes where he left them, the sides sweating with condensation in the humid ballroom air. He was exhausted and ready to collapse in his uncomfortably comfortable dorm room bed, but Zach wanted to dance with Cammie. At least once.

"… Tell me, Tiffany, are you enjoying the party?" He heard Moskowitz ask.

Tiffany. Nothing besides Cameron fit, but Tiffany seemed exceptionally mismatched.

"Tiffany is the_ life_ of the party," Zach chimed in, ignoring Cammie's pinched expression at his sudden appearance.

"Excuse me, Mr. Secretary," Zach continued, "But I believe this is your drink."

Moskowitz—a hapless ex-analyst Joe described as a 'genius toddler who was dropped too much as an infant—didn't even hesitate. He confirmed with his 'secretary' that it was his drink, which Cammie indulged with a smile and a nod, before he twirled his mustache and proceeded to fulfill every analyst stereotype with a very fake, very British "Good show!"

Zach continued with the small talk, but the Chameleon was zoning out. Her eyes were pinched with concentration, roaming over the scene like she was analyzing a sample through the lens of a microscope. Like mother like daughter; Zach wondered how much she could see.

"I was wondering, Mr. Secretary," Zach started, "would you mind if I borrowed Tiffany for a moment? She appears to be in need of dancing."

"Not at all," Moskowitz boomed, waving them away.

"They're playing our song," Zach murmured, spouting another line as he set down his own barely-touched champagne. Cammie didn't react as he pulled her into the waltz position, her hand in his with his arm around her waist.

"Don't try to cop any feels, Blackthorne Boy," she muttered, barely audible with her face his neck. "I could kill you with my undergarments."

"I wouldn't doubt it," Zach whispered back.

As the waltz began, they straightened and smoothly slipped back into their covers, just as Culture teacher passed by.

"So tell me, Tiffany St. James," Zach started, "What does a girl like you do for fun?"

"I didn't tell you my name was Tiffany St. James," she quipped. "How did you know?"

Oh. Whoops.

"Oh, I always make it a point to know the names of beautiful women," he murmured, pulling her closer. He could get drunk on the smell of her skin.

Dipping her after the god-awful line with a wink and a smirk felt like a bit much, but the teachers were madly scribbling on their clipboards with approving expressions. Cammie wasn't charmed; in fact, she looked downright uncomfortable.

"Come on, Gallagher Girl-" he spun her, making her skirt twirl, "Relax a little."

Her forehead creased. She stopped dancing, suddenly stiff, and he saw panic in eyes that had morphed into green.

"Hey. Gallagher Girl,"—what was happening? Why was his stomach churning? Why did she look lost and panicked and so entirely not—"You okay?"

She didn't answer. Her wide-eyed gaze jerked up to his.

"I gotta go!" She yelped, trying to pull away. Zach held onto her hand.

Madame Dabney lectured about proper goodbyes, but all Zach felt was the worry in his gut and the innate need to _know_. Zach didn't consider himself a hero by any definition, but if he could fix anything for Cameron Morgan, he would.

"Thank you very much for the dance," she said, before finally breaking free.

He watched her scurry, her skirts swirling behind her as she broke through the waltzing couples. He dodged his way off the dance floor, grabbing his champagne before downing it in a single gulp.

"Where'd she go?" Grant appeared out of nowhere. His hair was mussed and Zach swore the mark on his roommate's neck was a hickey, but he knew better than to ask.

"I don't know. That's the problem."

Grant shrugged like the answer was obvious. "You're a spy. You know her, where she might go… Follow her."

Zach was gone in seconds.

ooo

She was by the tapestry.

"Hey, Gallagher Girl. I thought I'd find you here."

She was startled, eyes wide like a caught little kid.

"What the hell are you doing here?" She breathed.

He thought the answer was obvious. "Looking for you."

"Why?"

Simple question; supposedly easy enough to answer, like his own name and the color do the sky. Zach knew there were a thousand answers, but he went for the least incriminating.

"Because this is where you went the other day. After the run-in with Jimmy and Tinker-bell."

"Oh."

Oh so _now_ was when she decided to be monosyllabic. Cammie knew better than to spill her guts, but Zach had found her and was seeing her at her most obviously vulnerable and the least she could do was to tell him what was _wrong._

"I thought this might be where you come," Zach continued. "When you're upset."

He looked up at the tapestry, letting his fingers stroke the ancient velvet, almost letting himself say,_ this is where I would come, too._

Zach looked back at her. She seemed to stop breathing as he moved closer. He was suddenly not the transparent one because she was looking at him with an entirely new kind of softness, like she was glad he knew where she hid and she was glad he followed her when the world became too much.

"So… what is it, Gallagher Girl?"

He was already leaning against the wall, propped up by one hand; she reached up and touched the stone, her fingers inches away from his. He could feel the heat in her skin, her breath on his neck as she opened her mouth to respond.

"I-"

But before she could finish, the sirens exploded and the world went black.

ooo

Zach had never liked the disappearing act. It was cowardly and cheap, the ultimate cop-out in the face of getting caught.

Still, he ran. The sirens blared and he had gripped Cameron Morgan's hand with a terror that rampaged, all too real, through his panicked veins as the school turned into a tomb and he felt his chest constricting in a way that meant so much more than nerves around a pretty girl.

He had been on the verge of a panic attack when the Grand Hall doors had opened. He had been halfway okay until Cammie confirmed that, no, Code Blacks didn't happen a lot—if _ever._

It was real. The end of the world had been happening all around them, and all Zach could think about was being able to breathe. Breathing would be nice.

When he got to his room, he stripped off the tuxedo jacket like the priceless fabric was melting onto his skin. He slung it over his chair, uncaring about whether it got wrinkled. The night was over and he would probably never need to use a tux for anything ever again. He wouldn't be _that_ kind of agent; this firebomb-failure of a night was proof enough.

The doorknob suddenly squeaked, alerting Zach that his roommate was coming. He barely moved, even when Grant smacked him on the back of the head and asked how the night went.

How to explain the inexplicable. That was more the question.

"I got lucky with Baxter," Grant boasted, stripping away his own cover like it was no more than a tuxedo—first the jacket, then the tie, then the shoes. "She's a biter. That one eighth grader owes me ten, because he said she wouldn't be."

Zach grunted in reply.

"Dude, what's up?" Grant asked, shuffling over to Zach's bed. "I know the drill thing was a downer, but it'll be fine by tomorrow and-"

"That wasn't a drill, Grant."

Grant stopped moving. Zach was staring at the white ceiling, but the air got heavier and he knew he had his roommate's full attention.

"Cammie said it hadn't happened before. She was scared."

Silence. Then, "Oh."

The boys got ready for bed in silence; brushing teeth, setting out uniforms before jumping into PJ pants and turning out the lights. Zach was almost asleep when Grant murmured, almost inaudible,

"Zach?"

Zach groaned. "What, Grant?"

"Was someone trying to get into the school? Someone… bad?"

Grant's naiveté was showing again. Zach swallowed thoughts of his mother, the Circle, the faraway ghosts that he chose to ignore because there was no way they would try to break into the Gallagher Academy. They wouldn't even have any reason to; the Circle usually didn't need more motivation than money to commit their crimes, but there was no way they would ever be stupid enough to break into Gallagher.

He hoped.

Zach swallowed, clearing his throat. "I don't know, Grant. I don't think anyone knows."

Grant grunted in reply. After a few minutes, Zach heard his roommate's breaths even out and knew he was alone.


	11. Chapter Ten

TEN

To say the school had been thrown into chaos would be a simultaneous understatement and exaggeration. Everyone was talking, but the teachers were pretending the sirens were all part of a paranoid drill; the girls were flirting with the boys like the formal had been nothing more than a night spent dancing in formal wear, but Zach and the Blackthorne boys were more aware of the wary stares than the giggling and the arm-touching.

Nothing had changed, but everything felt different. Zach's skin was crackling and he was looking over his shoulder and it all felt vaguely like Blackthorne, but only in the sense that paranoia—and sleeping with one eye open—was his key to survival.

So when Tina Walters waltzed up and asked Zach point-blank if he was with Cammie during the time of the Code Black, Zach lied through his teeth and ignored Cammie's pleading looks, only because it felt like the natural thing to do. The concept of her taking it personally flew completely over his head.

That is, until she stormed into the barn and pointed at him like he was being accused of a crime.

"You fucker!" She bellowed. He kept pounding away at the punching bag, ignoring her, but she stomped over and yelled his name. "You _know_ I didn't breach security and you _know _I didn't cause that Code Black. I know Tina Walters is the biggest, most annoying snitch in the history of Gallagher but it's _my_ reputation on the line here-"

Zach stopped punching. He was breathing hard—almost wheezing—but he had enough air to mutter, "You've done enough on your own, Gallagher Girl."

Her eyes widened. He could almost _see_ the steam coming out of her ears.

"Besides, I thought it was a _false alarm_," Zach said, sarcastic. His frustration was leaking into his words, feeding off of her boiling rage. She looked like she was about to explode.

She did, in the form of roundhouse-kicking the bag. It hit him in the gut—barely missing his balls—and he managed to give her a thumbs up, even with the wind knocked out of him.

"Nice one, Gallagher Girl. On the first try, too."

"Shut up. I know how to do it and _don't call me Gallagher Girl."_

"Cammie, look-"

"No, Zach, you _look_."

He stopped short. She took a deep breath, closing her eyes for a moment. If he wasn't sweating and she wasn't shaking with anger, the tapering sunlight and the chirping birds would make the moment almost peaceful.

"You left me there, alone, confused and guilty-looking and I just…" she pursed her lips, shaking her head. "This is serious. I have enough shit on my record and, yes, that is my own stupid fault, but this _wasn't_."

"You done?"

She nodded.

"Okay, my turn."

He stepped fully in front of her, gripping his shoulders. He could feel all the bone and muscle of a girl born to fight, but she was still soft. She still smelled like apples.

"Do you really want everyone knowing we were together? This place has enough sexual tension as it is."

She cracked a smile, but barely.

"Do you really think that any of that is Tina Walters's business? Because I don't."

She considered it. Maybe she agreed, maybe she didn't—but he could still see the need to clear her reputation in her eyes, as if that was all she had to hold onto after Jimmy walked away.

Jimmy. Something turned sour in Zach's gut.

"Besides, I thought you liked your interludes secret. Your _lovers _private."

She gasps, incredulous.

"That wasn't an interlude and God, Zach, you're not even my_ boyfriend-_"

"Yeah, I noticed."

Zach punched the bag again, harder. He wasn't quite to the point of envisioning Jimmy's face instead of the worn red leather, but he was close.

"What the fuck is that supposed to mean?" Cammie demanded, grabbing his arm before he wound up for another hit.

He stopped. He faced her with the bag swinging between them like a pendulum.

"You're the Gallagher Girl," he said finally, throwing her nickname back in her face. "You figure it out."

She pursed her lips, the fury turning them white.

Zach turned away, unwrapping his hands and grabbing his towel.

"Besides," he said, wiping his face, "At my school, we know how to keep quiet when the jig is up."

"Yeah, well," Cammie snaps, "That's what they teach us here, too. Our schools are the same."

Zach stops. His comeback falls short; all he has left to do is stare at her, amazed at her naiveté.

"Don't be too sure, Gallagher Girl," he murmured.

Even from ten feet away, he could see her confusion. She was scrambling for words, and for once he wasn't the one who felt stupid. He walked to the barn door, leaving her standing alone in the fading afternoon light.

"See ya around, Morgan," he called over his shoulder.

She didn't say anything before the door slammed shut.

ooo

After the bullshit 'group bonding', Zach knew something was off.

"Yeah," Grant was boasting. "And when we got to corridor, the British Bombshell-"

"Grant!" Zach warned. His roommate stopped short, eyes wide with alarm. The other boys—Jonas and a freshman, Roger—didn't breathe. Ever since the Code Black, everyone had been on edge.

Zach, however, knew there was more to the story. Their dorm room seemed the same, but there were near-imperceptible changes; his bedspread was less smooth, the air less still. Someone had been there when they were gone, and Zach knew exactly who it was.

He held up a finger, tip-toeing over to his desk. He pulled out an Evapopaper notebook—provided by the ever-paranoid Mr. Smith—and a pencil.

Grant gave Zach a 'what the fuck' look, and Zach scribbled his answer.

_I think the girls were here._

Grant gave Zach a withering look but didn't say anything else.

Zach may be imaging things, but there was no such thing as being too careful.

"Well, prude," Grant postured, filling up the awkward silence in case there was a bug in the room, "Whatever. You don't have to hear about my escapades with the female gender _if you don't want to_."

God, Grant was bad at this. Zach would lecture him on being too formal in his lying later.

"I don't give a shit either way, man," Zach said, silently signaling for the other boys to leave. They opened the door and shuffled out. "Let's just get ready for supper. I'm starving."

Later, they bugs in the walls. Trackers on their shoes. . They had left a few in key locations to evade suspicion, but Zach and Grant, for the most part, had their privacy back.

The Gallagher Girls were sneaky and clever to boot, but they weren't the only ones who were used to being underestimated.

"It's so on," Grant breathed as they stared at the collective pile of bugs on Zach's bed.

And Zach, despite himself, grinned in reply.

ooo

"Hey, Gallagher Girl," Zach said a few days later when Cammie cornered him after Culture class. Her determined frown was enough to intimidate anyone, but Zach stood his ground. He was determined to play it cool. "What can I do for you?"

"Mr. Smith says our midterm papers have to be in pairs. My mother said I need to 'embrace the collaborative nature of this exchange experience' and, since you seem to be one of the more intelligent and tolerable options, I'm choosing you."

Zach smirked. The slam was sly, but Zach ignored it. However passive aggressive, Cameron Morgan had practically asked him out.

"So you want to embrace me?"

She huffed. "Only in the academic sense. Look, do you want to do this or not?"

He made her wait. Her eyes were wide with impatience, and she was tapping her foot and messing with the straps of her backpack.

"So?" she asked, finally cracking.

"Sure," he said, grinning. He waited for the halls to be crowded with gossips and eavesdroppers before he yelled, "It's a date!"

Jonas caught up with him, frowning with confusion.

"What's a date?"

Zach shook his head.

"Nothing, Jonas. I'm just messing with the Chameleon's head."

Jonas nodded uncertainty, clutching his books to his chest. Of all the Blackthorne boys, Jonas had been the slowest to adapt. He still woke up at four in the morning, even though morning drills were a thing of the past.

"But why, Zach? What purpose does it serve?"

Zach pulled Jonas to the side of the hall, moving away from the flow of students.

"She's messing with us, Jonas. I'm giving her a taste of her own medicine."

Jonas' frown deepened.

"They're just suspicious about us after the Code Black, Zach. They're trying to defend their school from possible intruders which, in their minds, are us."

Zach rolled his eyes. "You've been hanging around Liz again, haven't you?"

Jonas didn't answer. His deep red blush was enough of an answer.

"I'm just _saying_," Jonas continued, somewhat indignantly, "That we have no right to mess with them. We are guests and they have every right to be suspicious of us, no matter how innocent we may or may not be."

Jonas shuffled away. Zach was frozen, unsure of whether Jonas was intentionally slamming Zach's questionable past or simply warning Zach against stirring the pot.

Either way, Zach was ignoring the sick feeling in his stomach.

ooo

The Gallagher library was Zach's favorite place in the mansion—maybe even the world. It was straight from Hogwarts or a Charles Dickens novel, all dark cherry wood and roaring fires, with everything from leather-bound books to current fiction and celebrity tabloids. He had considered asking Joe if he could sleep in the leather chairs instead of his sterile dorm room, but was a guest—and a tentative one at that. He didn't have the right to ask for anything, even something as simple as a different place to sleep.

He didn't have the right to say yes to Cammie's invite to work on the group project together, but that didn't stop him from paying extra attention to his hair and choosing the most secluded table in the room.

Because, despite everything, he liked being with her.

"Hey," she said when she walked in. She was in skinny jeans and a sweater, her hair in one of those updo things that look sloppy but are most likely part of a very exact science. It was too casual to be natural, but Zach appreciated the effort. At least she was _pretending _to be at ease.

"Hello, Gallagher Girl. You look spiffy this afternoon."

She gave him a withering look but smiled. She shrugged.

"This is _casual_ me, Blackthorne boy. I don't wear plaid when I don't have to."

She slung her backpack around the back of her chair, pulling out her textbooks and notes. Her lack of organization always surprised him; there were loose papers and notes in the margins, with doodles on nearly every page. Zach couldn't see much, but he saw some vines that looked like ivy. Skyscrapers. A smile that looked vaguely like his.

"So," she said, "What should we start on?"

Zach shrugged. "I don't know."

It was the truth, but he was hoping this meeting would amount to more than studying_._

"Zach-" there was his name again—"I was thinking we could look at the impact of propaganda in third world economies?"

Mm-hmm. He wasn't buying it.

"_That's_ what you were thinking?"

She was shuffling through her notes, her eyes darting over the pages as if she was organized enough to know what all the scribbling said.

"Yes. We could start with an outline and summarize out combined notes and-"

"Cammie, you don't need to be so efficient. We have four weeks to complete this project."

The withering stare again. "Zach, you've been here long enough to know that four weeks is barely enough time to do everything that needs to be done. There's research and creativity and organization and-"

"I know that," Zach snapped. His impatience was getting the best of him. "But I also know that there's more to why you asked me to be your partner than you say there is."

Her features were controlled, but she still wasn't looking at him.

"Was there another reason, Gallagher Girl? Something you wanted to ask me?"

She finally looked up. "No," she lied.

She was a good liar. Too bad Zach knew her too well to believe her.

The conversation seemed to be closed. Cammie went back to her notes, and Zach actually opened his notebooks to the correct pages. He was finally hitting his stride and collecting points they could include in their presentation when her voice broke the silence.

"So…" she started expectantly.

Zach glanced up. "So…"

The quiet must have been getting to her. He could tell she needed conversation.

"How do you like Gallagher so far?"

God, where to begin. The too-comfortable beds, the uniforms he liked less and less every day, the suspicious glances from Mrs. Morgan and every other girl who met his gaze…

"Oh," he replied. "It's swell."

He waited for her to ask for elaboration, but she just nodded and went back to studying. Zach scrambled for an opening so he could call her bluff and show her the bugs—Grant's idea, and a brilliant one at that—but a pair of eighth graders interrupted his train of thought. They giggled at Cammie, suggestively glancing between the two of them before running off. Cammie acted like it hadn't even happened.

"You handled that well," Zach said, nodding towards the girls.

Cammie shrugged, nonchalant. Any girl would pretend to be unbothered—Gallagher Girls, especially this one, were apparently no different.

"I've had practice, I guess."

Zach nodded. "Ah, yes—I'm sure the Jimmy escapade gave you plenty of practice."

She cocked an eyebrow, but he could tell she was flustered. "So you heard about that?"

He shrugged. "Who hasn't?"

Her jaw was clenched. She was mad, and it was time for Zach to go for broke.

"And, Gallagher Girl, I gotta say that I am disappointed."

"Dissapointed?" She asked, taken aback.

"Yeah, Gallagher Girl. I thought you had a reputation for being more proactive. Ignore the gossips, sure, but fights the rumors a little more than this. Call them out on their shit, you know?"

"Yeah, well what _you_ do if everyone thought you had breached security?"

Her mind games weren't going to work. He was on the offensive here, and he was not going to let her turn the tables.

"Well first, I'd get all the shit on the newbies. Students, teachers, janitors—everyone who is not certifiably, completely, one-hundred and fifty percent trustworthy. I would check on everyone's alibis the night of the ball. I would get close to the people I suspect, even go so far as to track their movements. Maybe bug their quarters.

She stared him down, still as stone. He could feel the tension radiating off of her and his hands were shaking, his composure slipping after keeping himself in check for so long, but he was almost done.

He stood. Collected his stuff.

"But you wouldn't do any of that. Right, _Gallagher Girl_?"

He pulled out the bugs—tangles of small wires, so tiny nobody who wasn't trained would ever notice them—and set them on her stack of notebooks.

He tried not to sound wounded as he said, "I'm not all bad, Gallagher Girl."

Because he wasn't.

"You're not all good, either," she mumbled.

Truer than true.

He hated that she suspected him and hated that she was completely right to do so. He hated that he could never be someone she could fully trust.

He called "Thanks for the date!" over his shoulder and was gone.


	12. Chapter Eleven

ELEVEN

Zach had always known the basics of his mother's life. She was the daughter of a postmaster in small-town Maine, where they lived in the big house by the sea where Zach grew up. She had been quiet and awkward, called 'weird' and 'retarded' by everyone at school until men in dark suits showed up when she was twelve and told her she was exceptional.

"I knew I was brilliant," Catherine would say, her voice drowsy with exhaustion and alcohol. "It had just never occurred to me that someone else knew, too."

She had been friends with a few girls, she said. Abbey and Rachel Cameron, Alicia Walters, a few others…

"I betrayed them all in the end," she said. "Them and the whole damn CIA."

She was twenty-four when Zach popped into the picture. She had been involved with the Circle undercover since she graduated from Gallagher, but the baby was the final straw—she filed her resignation and became everything she was told not to be.

She told Zach it was because of money. He had pretended to believe her, but Zach knew his mother—she wanted to spite everyone. She didn't care who she hurt or what happened, as long as she had her revenge in the end.

ooo

They finished their project in two more charged, stilted library study sessions. She didn't mention the bugs and he didn't ask her anymore questions; there were still gossips eager to catch something worth spreading, but they didn't fuel the fire.

They actually _worked._ They submitted the project early and Smith gave them extra credit and their interactions tapered off to furtive glances and sparring in P&E.

Weirdly enough, it was Solomon's class that broke the silence.

"Spies tell lies, ladies and gentlemen, but that's not what we are doing today. Today is about how to spot them."

Oh, lord.

Having Joe as a teacher was _weird_. The man had raised him more than Zach's actual biological mother. It was like getting an hour-long lecture from your parent once a day.

Still, Joe was smarted than anyone. Zach still soaked up everything, even if it felt sugar-coated for the sake of the Gallagher Girls."

"…For the sake of today's lesson, I think these will come in handy."

Joe handed out Fib's rings. He had gushed about the lie-detecting jewelry for five minutes before breakfast that morning, but he was cool as he handed them out to each student.

It almost made Zach smile. Nothing made Joe more excited than stupid gadgets—which was, according to the all-knowing Dr. Steve, Gallagher's specialty.

"Partner with the person across from you. Watch their eyes, pay attention to their voice. See if you can guess who's lying."

Zach couldn't help but grin when he met Cammie's gaze.

"Oh, this should be fun."

Her weary sigh didn't seem like an agreement, but Zach crooked an eyebrow and scooted his desk closer to hers.

"What is your name?" She asked.

"Zach," he replied.

"What's your full name? You know, full first, middle, last-"

"That's a pointless question, Gallagher Girl. Names are useless-"

"Zach!"

"Yeah, that's correct." He held up his hand, where the small ring barely fit around his pinky finger. "See?"

She gave him an exasperated look. Then, "Where were you during the Code Black?"

Zach grinned. The sassy Chameleon was back.

"That's better."

"Answer the damn question-"

"I was with you, remember?"

Her eyes softened ever so slightly, but Zach was already asking his next question.

"My turn—did you have fun last night?"

They had run into each other in one of the common rooms Headmistress Morgan had christened 'co-ed'. Zach had been playing poker with Grant, Jonas and a few other boys when Cammie and her crew sauntered in, laughing loud and free. Cam and Macey had been the only ones to stay and play, where they had both dominated and left with the candy stash the boys had been using in the place of money.

She had smiled a lot. Not at Zach per-say, but it had been a start.

"Zach, I really don't think that's what Mr. Solomon is trying to accomplish with this particular exercise."

Zach wasn't fazed. "I'll take that as a yes. We should do it again sometime."

She glanced at her ring, as if him casually/sort-of asking her out was a lie.

Either the girl had horrible self-esteem or trusted him no more than she would trust an ex-con with gang tattoos. The latter, if she was as smart as she seemed.

"Where are you from?" she asked, sticking to the assignment.

"The Blackthorne Institute for Boys," he answered.

_Maine. Up north, in this crappy house that's falling apart. I think there are bodies in the basement, but then so is my mother's liquor stash and Beatle's record collection._

"What do your parents do?" she continued.

Zach froze. The real answer—_kill people_—flashed in his mind, but he was too rattled to give a direct answer.

"What do you think they do?"

She was considering the answer, weighing in her mind all the options for the parents of a Blackthorne Boy.

From where he sat, he knew the options were limited. She seemed at a loss, though, so she started with what she knew.

"They were CIA?"

The sadness in Zach was suffocating. The air had shifted and he could see some kind of understanding in her expression—she thought his parents were like her dad. That they had died while doing something noble, heroic, for the greater good.

Zach specialized in non-answers. This time, it was just too easy.

"They used to be."

ooo

He felt her gaze for the rest of the day. Between classes, at dinner—god. She felt _sorry_ for him.

It was better than her usual annoyance, but Zach didn't want pity. He didn't want her to stop disliking him merely because she thought he was with her in the half-orphan sphere of society. If she liked him for any other reason, it wouldn't last beyond the end of the semester.

He needed to tell her more. He obviously wouldn't tell her everything, but he wanted her to know enough to stop feeling sorry for him. Her sympathy was worse than her suspicion.

After lights out, he followed her to one of her many hideouts. He stood outside the fireplace entrance for what felt like forever, knowing she was probably making notes on Blackthorne's behavioral patterns or listening to the few bugs he and the boys had left behind. He was jittery and kept fidgeting with his hair and hoodie.

He hadn't taken the medicine in a long time, but—until he stood in that dark room, waiting for the Chameleon to emerge—he hadn't needed it. Now, his hands were shaking and he was either going to collapse or explode.

At about eleven-thirty, he heard her footsteps.

"So the tour is closed, huh? After-hours and all that?"

She hadn't heard him, because she jerked up and bumped her head on the fireplace ceiling. Zach immediately sprang towards her.

"Ow," she moaned. She cut her eyes at him, clutching the back of her head. "What are you doing here? Do you know how much trouble we could be in if they find us?"

The irony was lost on her, but he didn't care. All he was thinking about was her possible concussion.

"Come on," he said, pulling her from the inside of the fireplace.

Cammie stumbled forward, joining him in the moonlight. He chose to ignore her skimpy tank top and shorts and the delicious smell coming off of her skin and the freshness of her toothpaste-breath. He felt the back of her head, combing through the slightly-damp hair until he found her bump. She flinched. He felt light-headed.

She looked up at him, all wide eyes and parted lips. She tried to pull away, but he pushed harder on her head and did his best to keep her close. Closer.

She shivered.

"You'll live," Zach said.

She almost cracked a smile, pulling away. He let her go. "You're being nice," she bantered.

"Yeah, well, don't tell anyone. It'll blow my cover."

She smiled in earnest.

Taking a shot in the dark, Zach crossed his arms and pasted on his best smirk. "So, have your bugs heard anything interesting?"

She was shocked and failed to hide it. Her mouth opened and closed, no words coming out, and Zach smiled.

"What is it, Gallagher Girl? No snappy comebacks? No cutting remarks? Cat named Suzie got your tongue?"

She frowned. "How do you know about Suzie?"

Long story.

He pointed to himself, stating the obvious. "Spy."

She sighed. "Oh, really now. Thank you _so much _for that clarification."

He shrugged, grinning. "You get so flustered around me, I think you forget."

He had meant to tease, but she didn't retort. She just stood there, letting the silence linger, looking at him in a way that felt entirely new.

They drifted closer again. Closer still. Zach's breath had stopped in his chest as their bodies barely brushed; he reached, almost unconsciously, to her face. He brushed the hair out of her eyes, barely touching her skin, so close he could _feel _her breath—

And it all came rushing back. Joe's warnings, Rachel's lectures, Catherine's insane rants and the sound of bodies hitting the floor, dead at Zach's hands.

He pulled back. Cammie looked like she wanted to know why, but he offered no explanation.

"Ask me about them," he said, changing the subject. Remembering why he came. "I'll tell you mine if you tell me yours."

Her eyes were huge with sadness.

"It was a mission. He went on a mission, didn't come home. Nobody knows what happened."

He knew someone who would know.

"Somebody knows," Zach murmured.

"What are you saying?"

The blurred edges and soft moments were gone. She was sitting around, moping, and pretending like the answers were impossible to find.

He couldn't help her look, but he knew she didn't need his help.

"I'm saying somebody knows. The answers are out there, but you have to look for them."

She threw up her hands. "What am I supposed to do, Zach? I'm sixteen and still in high school."

She wasn't getting it. "Yes, but you're a Gallagher Girl. You're Cameron Morgan, for godssakes. When was the last time you asked anyone for permission on anything?"

She was quiet as he walked away. It was better that way, because he knew that she could say one word and he would turn around in a heartbeat.

ooo

The panic attack didn't hit until he got back to the dorm room.

His hands still smelled like her apple blossom shampoo.

"Zach? Is that you?"

He needed to get it off. He would wash his hands until all of his skin was gone, his bones had disintegrated, his blood had evaporated and everything about that smell was gone, gone, _gone_.

"Zach, I know that we're supposed to be acting like anal-retentive boot camp brats, but washing your hands a million times is over-achieving a bit, don't ya think?"

He still smelled it and it was _everywhere_.

He still felt her breath on his face, her hair in his hands.

He still saw the sadness in her eyes, big enough to swallow him, her, the whole universe whole.

The sadness that he, however inadvertently, had helped cause.

Zach turned off the faucet, gripping the side of the sink, gasping like a fish out of water. Grant stood just over his shoulder, and Zach could hear the silent questions echoing in in his friend's mind.

Zach knew he owed an explanation to his roommate.

He owed so much to everybody, it was overwhelming.

"I almost kissed her, Grant," he choked out.

There were a few seconds of silence.

Then, "Dude, that's a good thing." Grant's voice was puzzled. "Why are you acting so crazy?"

Zach's throat went dry.

He leaned against the wall, sliding down to the floor.

He put his head in his hands, hiding his anguish, because he had already lost so much of his dignity and he didn't want his roommate to see him cry.

"Did I ever tell you about Emma?" Zach croaked.

Grant slid down beside him. "No. You barely tell me anything, let alone anything about old girlfriends."

Zach smiled ruefully, even though his hands still covered his face. They were shaking.

"Old girlfriend. It's singular. As smooth as I am, she was the only ones who stayed."

Grant didn't laugh at the joke. Zach knew that it wasn't really meant to be a joke, anyway.

"She was the daughter of an informer," Zach continued, his voice hushed. "He worked for the CIA or MI6, one of the two. I was fourteen and she was, too, and we had only met that one summer, in Singapore, when Catherine met her dad for a meeting. Neither of us were technically supposed to be there, but I was trying to cover my ass because Catherine was getting suspicious about me and who my loyalties were to and I had planned to stay there for the whole summer, even before Emma. Her dad just never wanted her to be out of his sight."

Grant nodded, frowning, but Zach was going to fill in all the blanks. Time to come clean, even if it was to the juvenile son of a plastic surgeon

"Catherine had suspected something, I think, but she didn't know anything for sure until she caught us. We were just making out, nothing big, but she was furious. She kicked Emma out and told me her father wouldn't be working with the Circle anymore, as far as she was concerned."

Zach's mouth was dry and his lips were sticking to his teeth, his tongue like cotton balls and his throat sore and scratchy—but there was more.

"One of Catherine's thugs told me later that a Circle SUV had forced them off of a bridge. No one even questioned that it wasn't an accident."

Zach had been looking at his chapped hands, calloused and bruised from sparring, but he finally met the eyes of his friend. Grant was somber, his eyes sad, but Zach could still see the confusion.

The last part was the hardest.

"Catherine is my mother. Catherine Goode. She used to go to Gallagher, used to be CIA, but she quit when she had me and joined the Circle of Cavan."

Grant's eyes widened. He looked stunned.

"Wow, man," Grant mumbled, huffing. "The other guys say you've got a past, more of one than most of us, but I didn't think that meant-"

"That I am the son of a terrorist? Yeah."

Silence fell and the ticking of their alarm clocks filled the room.

"My parents are fucked up too, if it makes you feel any better. My mom is never not sleeping with someone besides her husband of the hour and my dad once killed a woman who was addicted to liposuctions."

Despite himself, Zach laughed. It hurt, but it felt good.

"You're a good friend, Grant."

Grant was less surprised at the words than Zach, who couldn't remember the last time he had known someone well enough to call them his friend with any certainty. It was terrifying.

"I am, Goode. This is why I'm telling you what you're probably sick of hearing-"

Zach gulped.

"—Don't mess around with Morgan beyond our time here. Everything is free-wheeling until the end of the semester, but you gotta leave it alone after that, man. She's not going to do this forever. She's going to get married and have kids and live a halfway normal life, but you, _us_…"

Grant didn't need to say it.

Zach was stuck.

He pulled himself off and brushed off the back of his pants. "We have to sleep eventually, I guess."

And that was it. He was done.


	13. Chapter Twelve

**hey look here's a disclaimer because I do not own any of these characters wow**

* * *

><p>TWELVE<p>

Two weeks.

He stayed away for two weeks.

Before Gallagher, he had thought that avoiding someone was one of the easier tasks in life. He knew how to avoid eye-contact and strategically duck out whenever he was about to pass someone in the hall. He knew how to make someone feel like they had ceased to exist.

With Cammie, it was difficult. Not impossible, but difficult.

He could feel her gaze more than ever. She was confused and more eager than ever to solve the puzzle he had tossed in her lap. She was intrigued and drawn in and if he had wanted to push her away, cracking open a small, lie-coated chunk of his life was the wrong move.

He should have pulled the vanishing act at the beginning of the semester. It would have been easier than this.

"You okay, kid?" Joe asked in the breakfast line. It was a week after the almost-kiss.

Zach couldn't lie to Joe. He didn't know how.

"I can't wait to get out of here," was all he mumbled, barely moving his lips.

Joe didn't gloat or give Zach more useless advice. He just refilled his coffee, patted Zach's shoulder and made his way back to the staff table.

That was one week.

Two weeks later, he caved.

ooo

Days off at Gallagher were rare. Blue-moon, when-pigs-fly kind of rare.

It was an opportunity Zach didn't want to pass up. He just didn't know how.

"Ask her to get some coffee or something," Grant mumbled distractedly, looking over his notes as Zach obsessed.

"I don't want it to be too serious, you know? But this is my last chance, my only chance, for her to think of me as a person and not some annoying… asshole."

Grant cocked an eyebrow. "Good luck with that."

Zach let out a whoosh of air. They were going to Roseville that Saturday and it was already Thursday night.

This was it.

Zach glanced at the clock—midnight, dammit—and sighed. Grant looked up.

"Look, Zach, just keep it casual. It's just one day. Write it on Evapopaper and tease her and just… Be yourself."

Zach chuckled bitterly.

"What does that even mean?" He mumbled, but Grant was already back to his homework.

Zach gripped the pen, scribbling in his neatest scrawl, then folded up the paper and stuffed it in his notebook.

He would give it to her tomorrow.

ooo

Even after he brush-passed it, he was second-guessing his message.

"What did it say?" Jonas asked.

"'So I hear we get to go to town this weekend. Want to catch a movie or something?' Then I signed my initial and added, god, I added 'That is, if Jimmy doesn't mind.'"

Jonas nodded, contemplative.

"You asked the wrong nerd, Goode."

Zach sighed.

"I know."

ooo

McHenry was the one who replied.

Dinner, on the Friday after Zach passed the note, Senator McHenry's daughter sauntered up to the Blackthorne table; she ignored the drooling underclassmen and wandering hands, stopping directly in front of Zach.

"Goode, I am here on behalf of Miss Morgan in reply to your request."

Zach bristled. "Why didn't she come here herself?"

"_God _your ego is fragile. She is uncomfortable around large gatherings of males—don't take it personally."

Zach raised an eyebrow. "So you_ are_?"

Macey rolled her big blue eyes. "No. You just don't intimidate me."

Zach nodded. "Okay…"

"In summary, she said yes. Meet her at the front door at ten. My advice? Look hot and do _something _with your hair."

Zach didn't commenting on her unwanted advice.

With that, she spun on her heel and walked away at a fast clip.

ooo

She looked nice.

The sun was shining and everyone was buzzing with excitement, but Cammie was staring at him with this weird half-smile, carefully casual in a skirt and sweater. She had done something with her makeup and her hair was down, all waves and bangs that seemed just a little too long.

If she didn't hear his pounding heart, she must have been deaf.

"You ready to go?" He asked, stuffing his hands into his pockets.

"Yep."

They walked with the herd, silent. It wasn't exactly awkward, but Zach could tell she was scrambling for something to say.

Either that, or her friends—who were probably on Comms, knowing Cammie—couldn't think of anything.

"So do you want to do something?" She asked, once they reached the main drag. The group split up, darting into different directions, but Cammie stopped. Zach stayed at her side.

"We could see a movie," he suggested. "It's either Disney or a slasher flick, but I'm up for either."

"Okay…"

"Or get something to eat."

"Okay."

"Or we could do what we're doing now and just… Walk."

"Okay…"

God she was being difficult. Was she even listening?

"Or we could have the clown paint our faces and rob the bank."

She looked skeptical.

"Nope. They installed a Stockholm Series 360 last October, so that's forty-five minutes to crack it, plus the holdup and collecting money and escaping-"

Zach's laugh bubbled up, almost out of nowhere. "You've thought this out. Ever robbed a bank before?"

She smiled coyly. "I'm just prepared."

"Good to know."

The place was packed with people of all size and color; old men on tricycles and girls in tutus, with church ladies selling brownies and pot-bellied dads hauling around screaming kids and strollers.

It was the strangest circus Zach had ever seen, but seemed to be the norm for Roseville.

"So is this anything like the fair?"

Cammie jerked her gaze to his. Her eyes were green with anger and confusion and she looked like she was ready to strike, but Zach held up his hands.

"I read your report. The one about Jimmy."

She crossed her arms, trying to control her features.

"Figures. Who gave it to you?"

"No one," Zach replied. "I knew about you from Joe and hacked into the system to read what I could."

"How?"

He smirked. Pointed to himself.

"Spy."

She nodded. After the initial shock, she seemed strange accepting.

"The fair had more junk food. More lights, fewer fat guys on motorcycles."

She was almost smiling; her eyes were almost blue.

They walked in silence on the main drag for a few more minutes. In his peripheral, Zach saw the drug store where Cammie talked to Jimmy.

"Did everything happen exactly like in your report? Word for word?"

She shook her head. "Not exactly. I have a good memory, but I couldn't recite an entire semester, verbatim. There are always discrepancies and human error with these kinds of reports. The CIA knows how to get the gist and ignore the rest."

"Yeah, but it just felt… Different."

She frowned, confused. Zach chose his words carefully.

"You're different in person," he babbled. "You're snarky and aggressive and angry and you curse like a sailor, but sometimes your report felt like an episode of _The Brady Bunch_."

Her eyes crinkled—a real smile.

"Zach, most of the CIA higher-ups were going to read that. I wasn't going to tell them about everything my friends and I talk about, or how close Josh and I got, or-"

God, a sucker-punch to the gut. Zach interrupted,

"It just doesn't feel like you. It seemed like a legend was writing it, or just a…"

Her smile was massive, like a cat that got the cream.

"A ditzy teenage girl?"

Zach nodded.

"Yeah, Zach," she said, like it was obvious. "That's kind of the point."

He wanted to kiss her then.

God, he wanted to kiss her.

On impulse, he grabbed her hand and dashed onto a quiet side street, away from the chaos and confetti of the parade. Something was bubbling up in his chest, spilling out in his unchecked expression as he pulled Cammie around to face him. Pulled her closer.

"So, plant any good bugs lately?"

Her smile faded, but not in the way that meant she was angry. The opposite—her eyes were soft. Blue. Her lips parted as he pulled her even closer.

"Just so you know, Gallagher Girl," he whispered, his words barely as loud as a breath, "I'm going to kiss you."

Her eyes closed as he moved his hand up her back to the nape of her neck, where the skin was soft and her hair was warm from the sun. He tilted his head and she stopped breathing and they were so close…

When he heard a noise and looked up to the reflection of a store window, where Jimmy stood. Staring.

And Zach knew he would never win.

"Oh my gosh, Cammie! It's you!"

They jerked apart and Zach let out a mumbled curse, pulling himself from her warmth as they faced the townies. Jimmy looked shattered and Barbie was beaming, but all Zach wanted to do was rewind to ten seconds before, when he was _thisclose _to kissing Cammie and neither of them had noticed Jimmy.

Cammie glanced at him—lightning quick—and he knew she had seen Josh's reflection. She knew that _Zach_ saw, and he couldn't tell if she wanted to smack him or rewind too.

Zach's stomach fell. Forget who saw what; there was no way this could end well.

"Hi Cammie!" Barbie crowed, hugging the stiff Chameleon. Zach half-heartedly returned her smile, but all he was really focusing on was the lack of Cammie's hand in his. "I'm so glad the two of you are here! Together!"

Desperate, much?

More pleasantries were exchanged—how are you? Oh, good. Nice weather—yes, spring is on its way—but Zach saw the other boy staring at Cammie like she was a lost dream, with his girlfriend casting worried glances his way, like he was due to disappear any second.

DeeDee suggested they start walking, which they more or less agreed to. Zach and Cammie fell in line behind the other two; Zach was tempted to grab her hand, but decided not to.

"Hey, you're going to think I'm crazy," she whispered.

"A little late for that, Gallagher Girl," Zach mumbled. Old ladies two feet away glared at the name of the school, but they ignored the townies. There was something different about Cammie's expression—her worried gray eyes—as she glanced around the square like she was waiting for the ghosts to emerge.

"Has anyone been following us?"

Zach forced a laugh, like the thought of a tail was ridiculous in a crowd that mostly consisted of girls in tutus.

Still, he understood the paranoia. His senses were always on edge.

"Besides your roommates?"

She rolled her eyes. "Yes, besides them."

Zach shrugged. He hadn't noticed anything, but that didn't mean much. He had been distracted.

"I haven't noticed anyone on our tail. Why?"

"The man in the blue jacket."

She widened her eyes, trying to add meaning as Josh and DeeDee glanced behind their shoulders. Cammie raised her voice, changing to code. "Don't you think he's toasty in that heavy coat?"

Zach let his gaze slide to the man in question. The recognition was instantaneous.

Zach knew him.

But he wasn't going to tell Cammie that. Gallagher didn't need any more reasons to find Zach suspicious.

"What about him?"

"The jacket's reversible," Cammie explained. "Ten minutes ago he was wearing it the other way. Do you think a lot of regular guys in Roseville reverse their jackets?"

DeeDee smiled. Josh frowned, facing forward, but Zach knew they needed to keep up the code.

"Look at that guy, Gallagher Girl. He's a mustard disaster waiting to happen. I bet he's got a massive stain on the other side and he's just trying to hide it."

Cammie didn't look convinced. DeeDee spun around, walking backwards with a grin on her face.

"What are what you lovebirds chatting about?"

Cammie recoiled, but Zach just grinned in reply.

"Cammie was trying to convince me that I should know that guy in the blue jacket."

His eyes connected with hers, telling her what he couldn't say.

"But I've never seen him before in my life."

He broke their gaze, ashamed at the lie but unwilling to show it.

"I have to go to the bathroom," she announced. Zach offered to join but DeeDee brushed him aside, leaving the boys along while the motorcycles roared and confetti cluttered the air.

Silence, silence, silence.

"So, you and DeeDee… How long has that been a thing?"

Jimmy grimaced. Zach tried to ignore that the other boy was two inches taller and handsome in the archetypical 'first-boyfriend' kind of way.

What did it matter who was better? In the end, neither of them could be with Cammie.

"A couple of months."

"Oh."

Zach nodded, at a complete loss for something to say.

"So…" Josh started. "You and Cammie?"

It sounded like he dreaded the answer.

"No," Zach said, truthfully. "We aren't."

"Oh."

And of course, Jimmy sounded much more chipper now.

Zach glanced back the way Cammie had vanished, wondering how long it took two girls to find a bathroom. The clock was ticking away in Zach's head, letting him know when five—then ten—then fifteen minutes had passed.

"If you two become more, you and Cammie, I mean… Don't fuck her up," Jimmy said, filling the air with more than roaring motorcycles and fire truck sirens. "I may not have been enough, but she deserves to be happy."

Zach swallowed. His throat burned.

"Thanks, Jimmy. I'll keep that in mind."

ooo

After another ten minutes of awkward silence and fruitless waiting, Zach made his own excuses and left to find Cammie.

"Hey, Zach!"

Zach whirled to see Grant and Jonas jogging towards him, out of breath and wide-eyed.

"Where did the girls go, man? They all vanished and we aren't on Comms with anyone from Gallagher. What's going on?"

Zach should have felt reassurance in realizing he wasn't the only one that was stiffed by his Gallagher Girl, but he didn't. There was something more going on.

"I have no idea, guys. I haven't seen Cammie for twenty minutes."

In the reflection of a store window, Zach saw DeeDee walk back to Josh. Alone.

"Maybe they had to go back for something Gallagher-specific?" Jonas guessed, his voice squeaky.

"Doubt it," a freshman mumbled. "This semester, we belong to Gallagher as much as them. Anything they would get called in to do, they would let us know too."

Grant frowned at Zach, squinting, his head tilting in a way that made Zach feel transparent. For once, though, he was okay with it.

"You know something, Goode," Grant mumbled over the marching bands and arguing Blackthorne Boys. "Spill."

"Actually," Zach replied. "I don't know anything. I just have a feeling."

"Back to the school?" Grant guessed.

"Back to the school."

Tricking the signal was the easy part.

The hard part?

"How in the _hell_ are we going to take these girls by surprise, Zach?" Grant huffed as they jogged through the abandoned courtyard. The warehouse was creepy to the point of abandoned horror-film set, but Zach ignored his jitters and looked at his watch. The Gallagher Girls had placed trackers in their shoes—but the Blackthorne Boys had done the same thing, too.

"We won't, Grant. Not entirely. All we need are answers."

"Which I suspect is exactly they want from us!" A junior bellowed. "Why else would they be following us—"

"Which they technically aren't," Jonas corrected. "They are merely following a fake signal that we are projecting, which in actuality is a slightly sped-up version of their own footsteps-"

"Guys! Stop!" Zach hissed. "They will be here soon, and they will hear us. Arguing about what they want, or how they are getting what they want, will not help. Let me handle Cammie. She's the leader, so she will probably know the most."

The other boys grumbled about unfairness and how Zach always got to deal with the 'hot ones', but his adrenaline was pumping hard for him to care.

She would be there soon. All he had to do was wait.


	14. Chapter Thirteen

**so i kind of copped out with the ending and i know yalls are going to give me shit but i honestly don't care. i finished the damn thing, be happy-maybe i will write an epilogue. or another story. haha.**

* * *

><p>THIRTEEN<p>

"So what happened after that?" Joe asked.

Zach was nursing his black eye. The adrenaline was still ricocheting through his veins; his leg was bouncing and he was ready to jump out of his own skin.

"Joe, I don't understand why you dragged me over to your room—at two in the morning—while the girls and everyone else gets to _sleep_."

"You're the most experienced, Zach. You will be able to give me the most detailed report."

But he wouldn't. That was the problem. Zach's mind had blurred since his failed kiss with Cammie; everything after that was gray.

"So you convinced the Gallagher Girls that you weren't the enemy operatives. Then what?"

Zach closed his eyes, sighing, trying to separate the night into legible pieces. The whole thing had clumped together like wet newspaper, but Joe was depending on him. Zach had to rally.

"…We infiltrated the building by taking down the 'enemy' agents…"

When he was done, Joe had given up the pacing and sat beside him on the bed. Joe's eyes were red with exhaustion; Zach could feel a similar sting in his own.

"So what now?" Zach asked.

Joe pursed his lips. "You pack up. You're leaving in two days, Zach."

Zach nodded. He figured as much. The Blackthorne Boys had served their purpose; there wasn't much reason to keep the delinquents around.

Zach still had questions, though. He knew this was his chance; Joe was tired enough to tell the direct truth.

"What about Dr. Steve? Was he actually trying to steal the disc?"

Joe shrugged. "That was his job. But he works at Blackthorne, so… Who knows?"

Zach knew the answer: his mother. Neither of them bothered stating the obvious, so they stayed silent.

"Are you okay, kid?" Joe asked.

Zach rubbed his eyes, avoiding the tender bruises. "I don't know, Joe. I'm just exhausted."

Joe nodded. Grasped his shoulder. "Get to bed, kid. The worst is over."

But it wasn't, and Zach knew it. That was the problem.

ooo

"You're already packed," was all she said in the way of greeting.

He smiled. "We've all got baggage."

_Ha. Haha._

She didn't even smile at his horrid pun. She just looked at him, her head tilted, like she was waiting for him to say more.

She pointed at his eye. "You kind of look like shit."

"Yeah, well, it isn't. He-"

"Hits like a girl?"

She was baiting him. One of the Blackthorne boys had used that line during P&E, which had infuriated Macey and started a very heated feminist-fueled debate, consisting of McHenrey, Baxter and Cammie yelling that 'hitting like a girl' was not a bad thing. He almost smiled at the memory.

"Not the girls I know," he said.

She had said all she was willing to give. She was turning, ready to leave it at that…

_Fuck it._

"Oh, and Cammie," he called.

She whirled around, her eyebrows raised.

Then he kissed her. He grabbed her—his arm around her waist—and dipped her, in front of God and the school and everybody. He heard hooting from the van behind him.

It was everything he expected it to be. It was a sucker punch in all of his organs; enough to make him want to run and want to stay forever.

"I always finish what I start."

She looked a little dizzy, which made him smile. He was walking out the door when he heard from behind him, "So is this goodbye?"

"Come on, Gallagher Girl. What would be the odds of that?"

He watched her walk away, bags in hand by the van. The feeling of being in a time warp was strong, because he was just as lost as before and he was left watching Cammie Morgan walk away, silky ponytail swinging, skirt swishing, chin up. She was so much more okay than him.

From the open doors of the van, he heard wolf whistling. Laughing. Yelling at him to get the hell in the van, they have a lot of road to cover.

At that moment, the list of uncertainties was supposed to be short. Nonexistent, even.

And yet—there she was. The one question mark that would never truly go away.

"Look back," he whispered. His chest was tightening—that familiar whoosh of the air leaving his lungs, suddenly, he realized, foreign—and he was needing to run and remember how to breathe.

But still he waited.

He waited until the doors were closed, shutting the word of Gallagher out of his life forever, before he got in the van.


	15. Epilogue

**this is it, friends. I might continue, I might not-we'll see. thanks for everything.**

* * *

><p><em>EPILOGUE<em>

When they got back, Blackthorne was different.

Each day felt progressively darker. Grimier. The whole place reeked of fear and sweat; every lesson they were taught seemed more intended toward malice, not obedience.

They have seen the other side, and now the grass was deader than before.

"I miss the waffles, you know?" Grant said one night, when the moon was gone and all they had left was grumbling stomachs and heavy darkness. "I mean, the Bombshell was great and it was nice to have teachers that actually, you know, treated us like humans. But I miss those goddamn waffles and the warm feeling you got with the coffee every morning and feeling like you were safe and…"

"It felt like home," Zach finished.

"Yeah," Grant agreed.

They were back to two-person rooms—Jonas was back in his room, with his roommate Chris—and, while the boys kept up the same routine of, utilitarian cleanliness, everything felt grungier. Dirtier. Blackthorne was the last place anyone would call home.

"Zach?"

"Yeah?"

Zach could hear the hesitation in his roommate's voice. "Do you… Will you ever try to see her again?"

Despite the change in routine and lack of creature comforts, that's what it all came down to—the girl. Would Zach try to see her again?

He knew what he wanted to do and what he was supposed to do. Too bad they were polar opposites.

"Probably not, man. Now let's get some sleep."

ooo

His mother had moved her Circle sect to a warehouse outside Seattle. It was damp as hell, but Zach stuck through. Ever since Gallagher, he had been in limbo—waiting for something to pull him through to the dark of the Circle or back to Gallagher. Blackthorne was, he realized, a barely-maintained in-between. It wasn't until he heard his mother's goons talking that he realized he was ready to choose.

"A Gallagher Girl? Really?"

"…Yeah. Catherine said it would be difficult—she's pretty close to the higher-ups, I guess—but it's doable."

They thought he was asleep, Zach knew, but the walls were paper-thin. Everything carried.

"When does she want to-"

"She's only just realized who she wants. She'll start planning soon."

_Soon._

They hadn't specified which girl his mother was after. Did it even matter, though? If you went after one, they would all rally around her—going after a single Gallagher Girl was like trying to burn down the entire school.

It didn't have to be his Gallagher Girl specifically for her to be in danger.

Zach felt that familiar clench in his gut, the same one that appeared when he shivered alone in his threadbare sleeping bag and thought of the girl in Nebraska with constellation freckles and a life of heroism and happiness ahead of her. The girl he would probably never stop wanting, but now might lose to the very woman he called 'mother'.

The universe was a bitch.

ooo

He had put in a call to Joe—his reply: _not now, but soon_—but Zach felt the need for immediacy. He had told his mother to fuck off, that he was done helping her do her y work. The plan to kidnap an unnamed Gallagher Girl was the last straw. He was done.

Now, all he needed was proof. He was the one contacting her, and she needed to know.

He used his dwindling money to take a bus to D.C. He would worry about somewhere to crash later—for now, all he needed was a cover and a trinket from the Smithsonian.

When he saw the postcard printed with the infamous Ruby slippers, he knew he had found the right proof.

_Be careful_.

It was barely enough, but it was all he could give.


End file.
